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The Continent of Opportunity 




AN AVENUE OF ROYAL PALMS IN RIO DE JANEIRO. 



The Continent of Opportunity 



The South American Republics — Their 
History, Their Resources, Their Out- 
look. Together with a Traveller's Im- 
pressions of Present Day Conditions 



By 
FRANCIS E. CLARK, ajX,-LU-DU 

Author of " A New Way Around an Old 
World" "Fellow Travellers" " Training 
the Church of the Future" etc., etc., etc. 




New York Chicago Toronto 

Fleming H. Revell Company 

London and Edinburgh 



Copyright, 1907, by 
FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY 



luiBRARY of CONC 
Two Copies K«;«'»e'3 

NOV 29 1907 

i ^Oepyngnt tnu> , 

ouss CL. m. NO,' 



^-^^oll 



New York: 158 Fifth Avenue 
Chicago : 80 Wabash Avenue 
Toronto: 25 Richmond Street, W. 
London: 21 Paternoster Square 
Edinburgh: 100 Princes Street 



^ 



To 

William Phillips Hall, 

well known alike in religious, in philanthropic 
and in business circles, whose generosity to the 
newly formed South American Christian En- 
deavour Union makes it possible to spread the 
tidings of the Society, by meatis of the printed 
page, throughout the " Continent of Oppor- 
tunity,'' this volume is gratefully dedicated by 

Hisfrie7id 

The Author 



I o{ 



^3 



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 

To many kind friends in the South American Eepublics, 
who greeted us on our arrival, gave us Godspeed on our 
departure, and furnished me with first-hand information 
about the countries of their birth or their adoption, with- 
out which this volume could not have been written ; 

To the United States ministers to Panama, Bolivia, 
Chile, and Argentina ; to the Secretary of Legation at 
Lima, Peru ; to our Ambassador to Brazil ; and to the 
American Consuls in Valparaiso, Buenos Ayres and Eiode 
Janeiro, for generous official and social courtesies, and for 
much printed information concerning the countries to 
which they are accredited ; 

To their Excellencies the Presidents of the Eepublics 
of Panama, Peru, Chile and Argentina, and to members 
of their cabinets and others in high official station, for 
kindly interviews, and for documents which helped me 
materially in obtaining a knowledge of their peoples and 
their countries ; 

To President Theodore Eoosevelt for a most generous 
letter of introduction to the diplomatic and consular 
representatives of the United States in South America ; 

To T. C. Dawson's valuable volumes on the History 
of South American Eepublics, published in the ''Story 
of the Nations " series ; 

To W. H. Prescott's undying work on *' The Conquest 
of Peru" ; 

7 



8 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 

To books of travel by Carpenter, Pepper, Tucker and 
others with whose stories of journeying by land and sea I 
compared and sometimes revised my own impressions ; 

To many volumes relating to the missionary operations 
of various societies, the reports of the American and the 
British and Foreign Bible Societies, the volume entitled, 
'' Protestant Missions in South America," Miss Guinness' s 
" Neglected Continent," and many pamphlets and leaflets 
which have enabled me to supplement and correct with 
the wisdom and experience of others my own impressions 
of the past and present religious condition of South 
America ; 

To the publishers of The Independent^ The Congrega- 
Uonalist, The Interior, The Advance, The Missionary Re- 
view of the World, The Journal of Education and 2%e Chris- 
tian Endeavor Woiid, for permission to republish some 
material which has appeared in their colnnms. 



CONTENTS 

I. By Way OF Introduction . . . • ij 

II. South America — a Country in the Making 17 

III. The Smallest Republic in THE World . 26 

IV. Contradictions and Contrasts in the 

Canal Zone 34 

V. The Republic of Colombia ... 43 

VI. Ecuador, the Republic of the Equator . 51 

VII. Curiosities of Travel on the West Coast 59 

VIII. The Empire of THE Incas . ... 66 

IX. Peru, Yesterday and To- Day ... 76 

X. Peru Redivivus 85 

XI. Lima, the Paris of the South ... 94 

XII. An Adventure in the High Andes . . 100 

XIII. Where the Stars Sit for Their Portraits 107 

XIV. Bolivia, the Country of the Great Pla- 

teau 114 

XV. The Switzerland of South America . 121 

XVI. The Hermit Republic of the Andes . .130 

XVII. Our Window IN La Paz . . . • iJ9 

XVIII. Ancient AND Modern Chile . . .147 

XIX. The Wealth OF Chile . . . -155 

XX. Valparaiso — The Earthquake-Stricken . 165 

XXI. The Jamestown OF South America . .174 

XXII. The Famous Journey Across the Andes . 181 

9 



10 


CONTENTS 




XXIII. 


Argentina, the Land of the Limitless 
Pampas 


. 190 


XXIV. 


A Prosperous Republic 


. 200 


XXV. 


Peculiarities of Buenos Ayres . 


. 208 


XXVI. 


Uruguay and the Uruguayans . 


. 214 


XXVII. 


Paraguay, the Isolated 


. 221 


XXVIII. 


Brazil, the Boundless 


. 229 


XXIX. 


Rio de Janeiro, the City Beautiful 


. 240 


XXX. 


The World's Coffee Cup and How n 
IS Filled ..... 


. 249 


XXXI. 


A Thousand Miles in Brazil 


• 257 


XXXII. 


Venezuela, the Turbulent Republic 
OF the North .... 


; 26J 


XXXIII. 


The Three Guianas ... 


. 271 


XXXIV. 


With the Presidents of Four Repub 
Lies 


. 278 


XXXV. 


How We Journeyed . 


. 286 


XXXVI. 


The Progress of Education 


295 


XXXVII. 


The Inscrutable Politics of Soutf 
America 


304 


XXXVIII. 


South America as a Mission Field 


311 


XXXIX. 


A Bird's-eye View of Protestant Mis- 
sions 


320 


XL. 


Lights and Shadows on the Map 


330 




Statistical Tables . . . . 


338 




Index 


343 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

Facing Page 

An Avenue of Royal Palms in Rio de Janeiro - - Title '' 

The Cathedral of Panama - - - - - -26-- 

A Steam Shovel at Work on the Canal - - - 40 x 

CuLEBRA Cut, Part of the Old French Excavation - 40 

Some Native Panamanians - - - - - -46/- 

The Throne of the Ancient Incas - - - - 66 »^ 

Modern Descendants of Incas ----- 66 

An Indian OF Chile - - - - - - - 148* 

A Bolivian Indian -- - - - - -148 

A Market Scene IN Chile - - - -- -152 

Along the Rqadside in Chile - - - - - 160 

In the Straits of Magellan - - - - - 160 

The Entrance to " Santa Lucia " - - - - 178 

The Universal Costume of the Women of Chile on 

Good Friday - - 178 

The Christ of the Andes - - - - - -i86>^ 

An Argentine Farmhouse - - - - - -igoy 

Argentine Indians - - - - - - -190 

Rio Harbour and City as Seen from Corcovado - - 240 ' 

The "Finger of God" Near Rio de Janeiro - - 242^ 

The Most Beautiful Street in the World - - - 246 

Drying Coffee - - - - - - - -252 

An Indian Alcade Away IN THE Sierras - - - 314 

The Altar at the Doorway of the Jesuit Church, 

Arequipa, Peru - - - - - - -314 

Map of South America - - - - - -336' 



U 



I 

BY WAY OF INTRODUCTION 

THE material for this volume was gathered dur- 
ing a five months' journey to South America in 
the interests of the Christian Endeavour move- 
ment which the author undertook early in 1907 at the 
invitation of Christian workers in di£Eerent countries. 

He crossed the Isthmus of Panama and sailed down the 
west coast from Panama to Valparaiso, touching at many 
ports. From Valparaiso he crossed the continent by the 
famous trans- Andean route to Buenos Ayres. Thence he 
sailed to Montevideo and thence to Santos and Eio de 
Janeiro, and, after spending nearly a month in Brazil, 
sailed for Boston by the longest but most available route, 
via Portugal, Spain and England. 

In the course of this journey he visited eight of the 
eleven republics of South America, namely, Panama, 
Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay and 
Brazil. 

During his long sea voyages of more than fifteen thou- 
sand miles, he had the opportunity of supplementing his 
own observations by reading many volumes on South 
American history and travel, and, while on shore, enjoyed 
unusual privileges in meeting people of all walks of life, 
from the presidents of several of the republics to the hum- 
blest citizens. He lived not only in hotels and on railway 
trains but in the homes of many of the people, and 
sought from all sources that which might be of interest 
and profit to his readers. 

During these months of travel and residence he learned 
that South America is peculiarly a country of lights and 

13 



14 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

shadows. It is possible for the traveller to bask in the 
sunlight, or dwell altogether in the shadow. A writer is 
tempted to make his picture too bright or too dark ac- 
cording to his own personal equation, or perhaps accord- 
ing to the section of the continent he visits. 

The writer who knows only the northern half of South 
America \rould be likely to declare the continent to be 
the most turbulent, unprogressive and benighted of any 
of the five. The traveller who visits only the southern 
half, especially if he confines himself largely to the great 
cities, will be likely to declare that South America stands 
near the head of the progressive continents. 

I have read some of the wildest claims for South 
America, and I have seen it, on the other hand, painted 
in colours so dark that a Bushman or a Hottentot would 
be ashamed to own it as his abode. For instance, a 
recent writer on Ecuador describes it as an earthly para- 
dise, a paradise before the fall, undisturbed by any de- 
ceitful serpent. The climate, the people, the productions, 
the means of communication, are all perfect, and even the 
hens are such prolific layers that "the owners have to 
give them medicine to prevent an over-production of 
eggs." This statement gives the impression that the 
writer, all through his article, is making game of his 
readers, and is endeavouring to find out how gullible they 
are, for Ecuador is a land of pestilence and disease, of 
revolution and political graft, of ignorance and supersti- 
tion beyond almost any South American country. 

On the other hand I have read magazine articles on 
Argentina and Brazil, written in the most lurid style of 
our own professional "muck-rakers," describing their 
weaknesses and mistakes, and making no mention of their 
wonderful progress, their present glories and the more 
glorious future that is opening before them. Such ar- 
ticles deceive only those who are utterly ignorant of 



BY WAY OF INTRODUCTION 15 

South American affairs, but naturally those who have not 
studied the situation on the ground, cannot refute these 
absurdities. 

The object of this volume is to give, so far as its brief 
compass and the author's ability will allow, a compre- 
hensive view of the countries and peoples of South 
America, their history, their possibilities, their chief re- 
sources, their intellectual and religious life, together with 
a traveller's impressions of present day conditions. 

South America is preeminently a country which one 
cannot treat as a whole. It would be no more mislead- 
ing to consider the United States and Mexico, or Spain 
and Great Britain, as one country, than to write of Ven- 
ezuela and Argentina as having a common history and 
destiny because they happen to occupy the territory of 
the same continent. Indeed, every one of the eleven re- 
publics, small and insignificant as some of them are, has 
its own individuality and its own interesting history and 
development. 

- To the average foreigner all the republics, except 
Brazil, seem to have the same genesis : — a settlement of 
adventurers, long centuries of exploitation by Spanish 
extortioners, followed by liberation from the Spanish 
yoke and a turbulent emergence into a more or less stable 
national life. Though this outline is true of them all in 
a general way, it is too meagre and lacking in details to 
satisfy one who desires any real knowledge of South 
America and South Americans. He who sympathetically 
studies these countries will be surprised to find the many 
currents and cross-currents of history which give to each 
land its own individuality. This history throws light 
upon the present conditions and character of the peoples 
as nothing else can do. 

For the sake of bringing out the individual character- 
istics of these republics a chapter is devoted to the his- 



16 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

tory and present condition of each. Other chapters give 
the writer's view of the resources, recent development 
and future outlook of many of the republics, while still 
others describe the politics, educational features, modes 
of travel, and religion of the people. 

The writer in this volume, as in his journey, begins 
with the Republic of Panama, follows down the west 
coast, crosses the Andes, and then travels north describ- 
ing the Republics of the East Coast and their character- 
istics. 

While the book is written from a Christian standpoint, 
and some chapters are devoted to the religious and 
evangelistic features of the country, it does not profess to 
give an exhaustive review of the missionary situation in 
South America. It would take several volumes of this 
size to accomplish that task, but the author hopes that 
enough has been written to show the value of the Chris- 
tian work already accomplished, and to indicate that in 
respect to Protestant missionary effort, South America is 
no longer the " Neglected Continent," but the Continent of 
Opportunity. 

I have chosen my title as containing the one word that 
describes most accurately the present and the future of 
South America. In all material matters, as well as in 
matters more spiritual, in her mines and manufactures, 
in her forests and fisheries, in her commerce and agricul- 
ture, in her schools and churches, in her politics and 
business. South America is to-day preeminently the 
Continent of Opportunity. 



n 

SOUTH AMERICA— A COUNTRY IN THE MAKING 

A Continent with a Future— The Climate of South Americar— West 
America and East America — Physical Features on a Gigantic Scale — 
South America's Greatest Handicap — Her Great Men— No Plymouth 
Bock— A Cruel Triumvirate— Simon BoUvar-^ Curiosity in Con- 
stitutions—A Bright Outlook. 

SOUTH AMEEIOA is a country in the making. 
Some parts of it, politically, are yet without form 
and void. In some parts order has come out of 
chaos, while other sections are still in the birth throes of 
revolution and evolution. 

But South America is a continent with a future. It is 
a land of possibilities and opportunities. 

It is interesting to almost every class of men. To the 
student of history it presents a fascinating field which 
has allured some of our greatest historians. The story 
of the Incas and the Chibchas of Colombia, those wonder- 
ful nations that, without knowledge of each other or the 
rest of the civilized world, attained such a high and 
complicated civilization of their own, never loses its 
charm. 

To the archseologist the ruins of Cuzco and Quito and a 
score of other places are of supreme interest. 

To the student of political science the history of the 
brutal Spanish invasion and the brutal Spanish rule, as 
well as the innumerable failures and more recent suc- 
cesses of the modern republics are constant warnings of 
" how not to do it." 

The naturalist wiU find in South America birds and 

17 



18 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

beasts, fish and reptiles, shrubs and trees which grow in 
no other part of the world. 

The entomologist will not lack for bugs, — the most 
beautiful and the most noxious that crawl or fly. 

The geologist will find a country rich in minerals of 
every description. 

The devout man will find among the people professing 
the religion of the ancient as well as the modern South 
Americans, "a feeling after God, if haply they may find 
Him," and, amid all the superstition and ignorance of 
ancient and modern faiths, he recognizes the fact that 
man is '■'■ incurably religious," and rejoices in the clearer 
light of a rational Biblical faith that is beginning to shine 
at many points in the great South land. 

Before considering the individual republics into which 
South America is divided, it is interesting to call to mind 
some geographical and historical facts which account in 
large measure for the backward state of civilization 
which one finds in some parts of this continent, as com- 
pared with the more progressive twin continent of the 
north. 

Though almost as large in territory as North America, 
the greater part of South America lies in the tropics, 
while North America lies almost wholly within the 
temperate and Arctic zones. To speak roughly, North 
America is a cold country and South America a hot 
country, and, in recent centuries at least, however it was 
with earlier civilizations, extreme heat has been a handi- 
cap to progress. To be sure, the vast plains of Argentina, 
the long seacoast of Chile and the table-lands of Peru, 
Ecuador, Bolivia, Colombia, Venezuela and Brazil have 
a comfortable and equable climate, but the approach to 
the plateaus of the north is through steaming, miasmatic 
lowlands which have proved a terrible barrier to civiliza- 
tion. 



SOUTH AMEEICA 19 

It is interesting to notice in passing how much farther 
east the southern continent lies than the northern. The 
two might with almost as much propriety be named West 
America and East America as North and South America. 
Payta, the most western town in South America, is about 
the same longitude as Cleveland, while Valparaiso, and 
almost the whole of the Peruvian, Chilean and Patagonian 
coast, are nearly on the same longitudinal line as New 
York. Indeed, there is a difference of but three or four 
minutes in time between Valparaiso and New York City. 
On the other side, Brazil juts far out into the Atlantic 
Ocean towards Africa, and there the Atlantic is only 
about half as wide from shore to shore as in the north. 

The physical features of South America are on a more 
gigantic scale than in North America. Its mountains as 
a rule are higher, its rivers broader and deeper, its forests 
more impenetrable, and all these features have presented 
obstacles to man which have daunted and delayed, if 
they have not utterly discouraged him in the conquest of 
the country. It is as though this continent were waiting 
for a later race of giants who, with scientific and me- 
chanical skill superior to any yet achieved, shall be able 
to subdue this richest of continents, which yet guards her 
riches so securely. 

The greatest handicap of South America, however, in 
comparison with North America, has come from the 
character and actuating motives of her first European 
occupants, and it takes a continent many a century to 
overcome the wrong bias given by the original settlers. 

"Gold, gold, gold, gold, 
Hard and yellow, bright and cold," 

brought the first settlers to the shores of South America. 
The religious motive, when present, was largely overlaid 
with the desire for conquest and riches, and was often 



20 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

used as a cloak for the most horrible atrocities, as when 
the Friar Valverde betrayed Atahuallpa, the great em- 
peror of the Incas who had received Pizarro and his 
cohorts so hospitably. With a cross in one hand and a 
Bible in the other, Valverde demanded that Atahuallpa 
should declare himself a subject of the King of Spain 
and receive baptism. 

When the mighty emperor of Peru threw down the 
book with indignant scorn at this outrageous demand, 
the friar cried out: ** Fall on, Castilians, I absolve you." 
"Into the helpless crowd," we are told, ** burst a mur- 
derous fire from the doors of the houses all around, where 
the Spaniards had previously been stationed. Aghast 
and bewildered by this display of powers which to them 
seemed necromantic, the survivors nevertheless manfully 
stood to the attack of the mail-clad horsemen who rode 
into the huddled mass, ferociously slashing and slaugh- 
tering. The Indians strove desperately to drag the 
Spaniards from the horses with their naked hands, and 
interposed a living wall of human flesh between the 
murderers and their beloved sovereign. At length 
Pizarro' s own hands snatched Atahuallpa from the litter. 
The Indian soldiers outside, hearing the firearms and the 
noise of the struggle, tried to force their way through the 
square, but the Spanish musketry and cannon mowed 
them down by the hundreds, and they fled before the 
charges of the cavalry, dispersing in the twilight." ' 

This quotation is only one of hundreds that might be 
made from the history of South America to show the 
perfidious and utterly inhuman way in which religion 
was made the handmaid of cruelty, treachery and avarice. 
South America had no Mayflower j she has no Plymouth 
Eock, and in these two facts can be summed up largely 
the difference between the two halves of America, re- 
^Dawson's "South American Bepablics." 



SOUTH AMEEICA 21 

ligiously, educationally, industrially. There has been 
little of the Puritan and Pilgrim leaven at work in the 
meal of the southern continent, until a comparatively re- 
cent date. But the leaven has been introduced of late, 
and has already begun to bring about its blessed and 
inevitable results. 

The character of the great public men of the two con- 
tinents has been another determining factor in the civili- 
zation of North and South America. North America has 
had Franklin, Washington, Lincoln, and many smaller 
Franklins, Washingtons and Lincolns. South America 
has had Pizarro, Almagro, and Bolivar, and many 
smaller adventurers of the same type, whose selfish lust 
for gold and power has cursed the land in the early days 
of European occupation. 

If there is any worthy exception in this cruel triumvi- 
rate who showed a spark of unselfish patriotism, it is 
Simon Bolivar, sometimes called the Liberator. He cer- 
tainly aided his own country, Venezuela, and most of the 
other countries of South America to throw off the intoler- 
able Spanish yoke, but he imposed or tried to impose a 
yoke of his own, almost as galling, and his character 
seems to have lacked the high moral motives and the 
"saving common sense" which marked each one of the 
great North American triumvirate. His character has 
been thus described by Mr. Dawson in his careful history 
of the South American republics: " From his earliest 
childhood a little feudal lord, owing obedience to no par- 
ent (he was left an orphan at three years of age) with 
hundreds of slaves at his orders, his precocious intelli- 
gence the object of that ruinous admiration with which 
thoughtless strangers and servants spoil a rich and lonely 
child, his naturally strong will uncurbed by any discip- 
line, he grew into manhood — arrogant, uncompromising, 
solitary, a deep thinker, wildly ambitious, marvellously 



22 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

brilliant, though lacking steady common sense, blindly 
confident in his own moral and intellectual infallibility, 
firmly convinced that he was destined for vague great 
things, inordinately fond of honours and praise, and ut- 
terly unable to distinguish his desires of gratifying selfish 
ambitions, and his yeasty notions of regenerating man- 
kind." 

Such was doubtless the character, as the stories of his 
varied adventures prove, of the most widely heralded he- 
roic figure of modern South America. It is not a model 
on which the youth of a continent could safely shape their 
lives. 

Preeminently, too, the history of South America has 
been the history of carnage and bloodshed. There is not 
another continent among all the six, if we count Aus- 
tralia as one, which has been so drenched in blood as 
South America. Australia has had no war and no blood- 
shed. Large sections of Asia, within historic times, have 
been free from carnage on a great scale. Our own conti- 
nent, even remembering our two great wars, has suffered 
but little compared with South America. 

Even before the Spanish conquests, the Incas, though 
on the whole a peaceful race, imposed their rule at the 
point of the sword and spear, on surrounding tribes, 
while during and since the Spanish conquest blood has 
flowed like water from Darien to Cape Horn. Every 
revolution in the olden times, and revolutions have been 
numbered by hundreds, was a gory one, and in some the 
slaughter has been incredible, so that some sections of 
South America have fewer inhabitants than they had 
four centuries ago. 

The siege of Cartegena in Venezuela, in 1815, by Mar- 
shall Morillo, one of Spain's greatest generals, is thus de- 
scribed: *'The besiegers suffered terribly in the pesti- 
lential swamps, but the defenders were reduced to the 



SOUTH AMEEICA 23 

most horrible extremities, during four months and a half. 
The provisions ran out ; fevers decimated the people ; 
the starving garrison ate rats and hides ; sentinels fell 
dead at their posts ; the commander drove out of the city 
two thousand old men, women and children, and of this 
procession of spectres only a few reached the Spanish 
line. Finally the surviving soldiers escaped by boats in 
the midst of a storm which dispersed the Spanish squad- 
ron, and Morillo entered a deserted city where the very 
air was poisoned by the rotting bodies of famished people. 
It is calculated that six thousand persons died of hunger 
and disease." 

Yet this was only a minor engagement ; thousands of 
similar tales might be told, each one vying with every 
other for gruesome slaughter. In one of the most recent 
civil wars in Colombia which took place between 1899 
and 1902, largely on the Isthmus of Panama, it is esti- 
mated that 200 armed encounters took place, and 30,000 
Colombians were slain, — a very considerable percentage 
of the whole population. So numerous have been these 
bloody revolutions that history will probably never re- 
cord half of them in detail. 

Another fact, if borne in mind, will help us to under- 
stand the history and present condition of South America, 
and this is that feudalism has always been contending 
with monarchy ; extreme states' rights ideas with auto- 
crats of personal force and power, who have constantly 
tried to play the absolute tyrant. 

When Spain conquered the Incas, and practically the 
whole of South America fell into her lap and that of her 
sister nation Portugal, the Iberian peninsula was just 
emerging from feudalism. Ferdinand and Isabella were 
practically the first successful exponents of a strong cen- 
tralized government. The Spanish generals and conquer- 
ors brought feudal ideas with them, and these ideas in 



24 THE CONTIKEKT OF OPPOETUNITY 

the course of the centuries developed into the extreme re- 
publicanism, tempered by assassination and revolution, 
which has characterized the South America of the last 
century. 

Bolivar dreamed of a United States of South America 
and worked for it. At one time his dream seemed about 
to be realized, but Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru 
fell apart, and even his genius and daring were not able 
to bring them together. The ^'United States of South 
America " seem as far from realization as in the days of 
Pizarro or Bolivar. 

States' rights have sometimes been carried to an extreme 
and absurd length. Some fifty years ago Colombia, then 
called New Granada, adopted a new constitution, the sixth 
it had enjoyed in thirty years. The name was changed to 
" United States of Colombia" and the nation was com- 
posed of nine independent states. One article of the con- 
stitution declared that " when one sovereign state of the 
union shall be at war with another, or the citizens of any 
state shall be at war among themselves, the national gov- 
ernment is obligated to preserve the strictest neutrality." 

The result of such a constitution among such a people 
could easily be foretold, and civil war succeeded civil 
war in quick succession for two and twenty years, until 
tired of extreme states' rights, in 1885, under a strong 
president, Eafael Nunez, who was dictator in all but name, 
the " United States of Colombia " became the " Eepublic 
of Colombia," with a strong centralized government, and 
the sovereignty of the individual states was expressly de- 
nied in the new constitution. 

Another provision of the earlier constitution was that 
"in naming the eight generals spoken of by the consti- 
tution from whom must be chosen the commander-in-chief 
of the army, all Colombians over twenty-one shall be con- 
sidered generals of the republic." This provision would 



SOUTH AMEEIOA 25 

surely have more than satisfied the alleged ambitions of 
the Colonels of Kentucky. 

This early bias in favour of feudalism, and this constant 
conflict between individual and state rights and the ambi- 
tions of selfish dictators, accounts for the seesawing of many 
of "the republics from one extreme to the other, and for 
the political turmoil and unrest which have been the bane 
of most of the South American countries. 

If this picture of greed, ambition and bloodshed, of 
unscrupulous and cruel leaders, seems hopeless and dark, 
let us remember that, nevertheless, South America is a 
land of vast resources, that she has given to the rest of 
the world some of our most valuable foods and drugs, 
like the potato, Indian corn, quinine and peruvian bark ; 
that her mines are unexhausted and her forests scarcely 
touched ; that moral and spiritual light has dawned upon 
many sections ; that freedom of religious thought and 
worship has been secured in almost every republic ; that 
education is being more and more prized and extended 
to the common people ; that apparently stable govern- 
ments have been established in more than half the conti- 
nent, — in a word, that the light is breaking everywhere, 
and that South America is after all the great continent 
of Opportunity and Possibility. 



m 

THE SMALLEST REPUBLIC IN THE WORLD ' 
Something About Panama, Fast, Present, and Future 

The Smallest Bepublio but not the Least — ^The Number of Panamanians 
—An Important Bit of Territory — Outside of the Canal Zone— Cu- 
rious Golden Treasures— The Children's Place in Ancient Panama — 
"Within the Canal Zone — The Eights of the United States — Colonel 
Gorgas, the Sanitary Saviour of Panama — A Mixed Population — The 
President of the Republic — Our American Minister. 

APEOMINENT American official is reported 
to have brought greetings, when he came to 
Panama, from ''the largest Eepublic in the 
world to the smallest Eepublic in the world." Then he 
smoothed over the wounded dignity of the Panamanians 
by explaining that, though small in population, Panama 
was great in possibilities, and great in strategic impor- 
tance, and thus saved and salved their sensitive feelings. 
Panama is certainly not large geographically, for it 
stretches only from Colombia on the one side to Costa 
Eica on the other, and is a narrow, contorted ribbon of 
land that seems to serve principally to connect North and 
South America, and to afford a tremendous barrier to the 
navies of the world, compelling them to sail 10,000 miles 
to get around to a spot less than fifty miles away as the 

^ The four chapters on Panama and the Canal Zone were written on 
the spot in February and March, 1907. It is believed that they por- 
trayed accurately the condition of things as they existed then. 
Naturally, conditions rapidly change from year to year, and even 
from month to month, but a description of the Canal Zone as seen by 
a traveller near the beginning of the American occupation will always 
have an interest of its own. 

26 



THE SMALLEST EEPUBLIO IN THE WOELD 27 

crow flies. To travel 200 miles south and north to make 
less than one rod to the east has been the fate hitherto of 
travellers going around the Horn, for, strange to say, 
when they got to Panama, after sailing around South 
America from Colon, they found themselves east of the 
point from which they started, for it is an actual fact 
that Panama on the Pacific coast is east of Colon on the 
Atlantic, owing to the contortions of the coast. 

The population of Panama is far smaller than even its 
territory would indicate. Three hundred thousand is the 
liberal estimate made by the Panamanians, which, very 
likely, would have to be cut down if a careful census were 
made. Under 90,000 of these 300,000 are in the Canal 
Zone, and in the two cities of Panama and Colon which 
lie at either end of the Zone, though just outside of it. 
Indian half-breeds largely occupy the interior, which is 
in part an impenetrable jungle, with a few footpaths 
winding through it, and a few settlements of small im- 
portance. 

But, if Panama cannot boast very much in the way of 
territory or population, it has occupied no small place in 
the eye of the world for the last 400 years. Some one has 
well said that ** since the days of Greece's glory no such 
smaU strip of soil as the Isthmus of Panama has gained 
equal distinction. It has been the scene of stirring ad- 
venture and the site of the wealthiest city in the world. 
It has been the subject of epoch-making diplomacy and a 
sphere of political disturbance. It is the seat of the 
greatest engineering enterprise in history ; an enterprise 
which is destined largely to revolutionize the commerce 
of the world and, more than any modern factor, to influ- 
ence the fortunes of the nations." 

It is much to say all that truthfully of any country, big 
or little, but it can all be said of the Isthmus of Panama. 

Moreover, it is destined to be a better, busier, if not a 



28 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

bigger, Isthmus in the future than ever it has been in 
the past. 

So exclusively has public attention been riveted upon 
that little strip of territory ten miles wide, called the 
Canal Zone, that the rest of Panama is as unknown as 
Patagonia, and yet it is by no means uninteresting. It is 
divided into the provinces of Colon, Panama, Darien, 
Chiriqui, and Veragua, and it is said that the inhabitants 
of the two last named provinces are far better speci- 
mens of the native Panamanian than many of those one 
meets in the two large cities of the Canal provinces, 
Panama and Colon, into which the riffraff of the country 
largely drifts. 

Chiriqui is evidently the most interesting of these out- 
lying provinces, and the little capital, David (pronounced 
Dahveed), occupies a fine situation on the northwestern 
coast. Buried treasure always invests its burial-place 
with a romantic interest, and the province of Chiriqui 
has yielded up many wonderful curios which make the 
antiquarians' eyes shine, and the adventurers' mouths 
water, for many of these buried treasures were of pure 
gold. 

Some Indians, many years ago, were digging a drain 
(the first and last, it would seem, they ever troubled them- 
selves about) when, what was their amazement ! to un- 
earth an image of solid gold. This whetted their appetite 
for treasure, if not their curiosity, and they speedily left 
off drain-digging for the far more exciting and profitable 
occupation of grave-digging, if we may call it so, for this 
image and other gold ornaments, which were speedily un- 
earthed, were found to be in the ancient graves of a for- 
gotten race that had left no other memorial. 

The graves in these ancient cemeteries were located by 
tapping on the earth as the native walked along. The 
welcome, hollow sound, which sometimes responded to 



THE SMALLEST EEPUBLIC IN THE WOELD 29 

the tap of his stick, told him that a grave was beneath his 
feet. Opening it, he would find that the grave had been 
lined with pieces of stone, and then cross pieces of stone 
laid on them. 

All sorts of things were found in these graves ; stone 
and pottery implements, pieces of pure gold, copper and 
bone ornaments, and ornaments of gold gilt, ''a species 
of pinchbeck, which the natives call * tumbago.' " Small 
idols in stone were frequently found, but none more than 
eighteen inches high. The frog was a favourite orna- 
ment, often modelled in gold. " The largest frog of pure 
gold," says Wolfred Nelson, the explorer, "weighed 
eighteen ounces. . . . Another thing that seemed very 
strange to me was a kind of bell," he continues. *'It 
was of gold, and an exact counterpart of the old-time 
sleigh-bell. It had a handle, and within were little pieces 
of metal, and those little bells, when shaken, emitted 
quite a musical sound." 

Perhaps these bells which Mr. Nelson found were meant 
for the ancient Panamanian baby, for the baby seems to 
have played as important a part in the domestic economy 
of that day as of this, since clay rattles, evidently meant 
for his use, were found in other little graves, as well as 
many whistles, which produced all sorts of notes. A pa- 
thetic interest to every father and mother attaches to 
these baby rattles from the prehistoric Panamanian 
graves. 

To-day, however, interest in the Isthmus does not 
centre in the wilderness of Chiriqui, with all its archeo- 
logical wealth, but in the two towns of Colon and Panama, 
which guard either end of the great Canal. 

They occupy a curious and anomalous position. They 
are the largest and most important cities of the Canal 
Zone, but they are not in the Canal Zone. They are un- 
der Panamanian law and guarded by Panamanian police, 



30 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

while, across a line, no more visible but less imaginary 
than the equator, lie Cristobal at Colon, and Ancon at 
Panama, which are under United States law and guarded 
by United States police. People who send letters directed 
to "Panama, Canal Zone," or "Colon, Canal Zone," as 
many do, make a mistake scarcely different from one who 
might direct a letter to "Montreal, United States," or 
" Boston, Canada." 

The rights of the United States were defined by the 
treaty signed at Washington in 1903, as follows : "The 
Eepublic of Panama grants to the United States in per- 
petuity the use, occupation, and control of the land, and 
land under water, for the construction, maintenance, 
operation, sanitation and protection of said canal, of a 
width of ten miles, extending to the distance of five miles 
on each side of the centre line of the route of the canal to 
be constructed." "The Eepublic of Panama grants to 
the United States all the rights, power, and authority, 
within the zone . . . which the United States would 
possess and exercise if it were the sovereign of the terri- 
tory ... to the entire exclusion of the exercise by 
the Eepublic of Panama of any such sovereign rights, 
power, and authority." 

That is all definite and exact, and if it does not mean 
practical ownership of the zone, it is dif&cult to see what 
it does mean. 

Besides this, we have rights over any other land or 
water that may be " necessary or convenient for the con- 
struction, maintenance, operation, sanitation and protec- 
tion, of said canal." This gives us a right to quell in- 
surrections, to put down any serious disturbance, to enter 
every house in Colon or Panama, to inspect and reform 
its sanitary condition, and to do about anything that 
needs to be done. 

Because of this wholesome and necessary treaty, and 



THE SMALLEST EEPUBLIC IN THE WOELD 31 

by reason of this alone, it has been possible to make 
Panama and Colon as healthy as any tropical cities in the 
world. Col. "W. C. Gorgas, the sanitary saviour of Cuba, 
has utterly banished yellow fever from the Isthmus also. 
He has sent his inspectors into every house. They have 
tipped over every old rainwater barrel, and filled up 
every old cistern. Colonel Gorgas has introduced good, 
wholesome aqueduct- water in the place of rainwater, has 
drained the city and provided it with sewers, has repaved 
most of the streets, and transformed Panama into as 
wholesome a city, from the sanitary point of view, as one 
would ask to live in. 

"How did the Panamanians stand this Interference 
with their natural and vested rights in bad drainage, 
bad water, and mosquitoes ? " I asked him. 

'' Oh ! they were just indifferent," he replied. " They 
didn't care so long as we paid for the so-called improve- 
ments." 

But very likely these Panamanians thought these 
Yankees were queer fellows to spend so much time and 
money in killing a few harmless mosquitoes. 

Doubtless Colonel Gorgas will go down to history as one 
of the great men of A m erica. More than any other one 
man, he has made the canal possible, for, until he ban- 
ished the Stegomia mosquito from the Isthmus, even 
Uncle Sam's treasury was scarcely deep enough or large 
enough to dig the Canal, to say nothing of the frightful 
loss of human life. The Stegomia would have defeated 
us, as it did the French. 

A most genial, kindly man is this chief sanitary officer 
of the Canal Zone, with a kindly twinkle in his eye and 
a generous word for every man. No one on the Isthmus 
is so honoured and beloved by all classes and conditions 
of men, for he cares for the moral and religious welfare of 
the people, as well as for their sanitary welfare. He 



32 .THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITT 

fights moral microbes as well as mosquitoes, malaria, and 
plague-carrying rats. All were delighted when Presi- 
dent Eoosevelt, on his visit, hugged Colonel Gorgas 
openly on his arrival. 

It is no easy task to keep in order and keep at work 
the decidedly mixed crowd that flock to the Isthmus, 
many of whom are adventurers and soldiers of fortune. 
The police records for the month of January show the 
mixture of nationalities. In that month, 520 arrests were 
made by 168 police officers. Of this number, there were 
thirty-six Americans, three Antiguans, fourteen Bar- 
badians, one Belgian, eleven English, four Chileans, one 
Finlander, eight French, five Germans, three Irish, six- 
teen Italians, seventy-nine Jamaicans, forty Martinicans, 
three Mexicans, one Norwegian, thirty-eight Pana- 
manians, three Peruvians, one Scotsman, twenty-eight 
Spaniards, one Swede, seventeen St. Lucians, six Syrians, 
one Cuban, eleven Trinidadians, and eleven from other 
West India islands. 

While many of the Panamanians are shiftless and un- 
enterprising, these characteristics are not true of all. 
President Manuel Amador Guerrero is a man of educa- 
tion and refinement, with a piercing black eye and an 
eager, cordial way of grasping your hand, that makes 
you feel at home at once in his modest palace. He speaks 
English, as do other members of his cabinet. He is a 
doctor of medicine by profession, and though perhaps 
disappointed when he found out that I was nothing but a 
Doctor of Divinity, he did not show it, but gave me a 
most cordial reception. He is no longer young, but is 
still active and vigorous, and he belongs to an old and in- 
fluential family of Panama. Under his somewhat limited 
authority he is giving the country an excellent adminis- 
tration. 

Hon. H. C. Squires, the American minister to Panama, 



THE SMALLEST EEPTJBLIC IN THE WOELD 33 

is naturally a man of large importance at this juncture, 
comprising, as he does, since Governor McGoon's depar- 
ture for Cuba, some of the functions of Governor of the 
Canal Zone, as well as minister to Panama. His diplo- 
matic experience has well fitted him for this important 
post. In Cuba he occupied a similar position after the 
Spanish- American War, and in China, as Secretary of 
Legation before the Boxer troubles, and during the siege 
of Pekin, he won golden laurels, laurels which evidently 
fit his brow in this new situation. 

On the whole, Canal Zone matters seem to me to be in 
an exceedingly satisfactory condition. Of course, there 
are fiaws and imperfections. In such a vast work it 
could hardly be otherwise. The state of morals is low in 
some sections of the Zone, doubtless, and many young 
men go to pieces, physically, mentally, and spiritually, 
through rum and loose living. The churches and other 
moral forces are not yet exerting the influence they should 
or will exert, but things are on the mend : the forces of 
law, order, and morality are growing stronger month by 
month, and the "smallest republic in the world" is by 
no means the least or worst. 



IV 

CONTRADICTIONS AND CONTRASTS IN 
THE CANAL ZONE 

^The Point of View— Imagination Needed— Colon and Cristobal— The Pes- 
Bimisf 8 View— The Optimist's Opinion— English-American Predic- 
tions—The Abolition of the Mosquito— Colon as a Health Resort— 
What the French Taught Us— De Lesseps' Palaces- Lightning 
Transformation Scenes — How the Dirt Flies— Discarded French Ma- 
chinery — Lake-Making versus Ditch-Digging. 

ONE cannot be long in the Canal Zone without 
coming to the conclusion that it is aland of con- 
tradictions, and this characteristic accounts, 
doubtless, for the contradictory reports concerning the 
Isthmus that are current at Colon and Panama. 

One man can see nothing but misery, miasma, and mis- 
takes ; another nothing but health, happiness, and hope. 
It depends partly upon one's point of view, but even 
more upon one's habit of mind. One does not need to be 
much of a muck-raker to find plenty of muck (at least in 
the streets). On the other hand, if one lifts up his eyes, 
he sees that the stars are still shining over the Canal 
Zone, that the greatest canal in the world is becoming a 
tremendous fact, a fact that is growing more and more 
impressive day by day. 

If one has a moderate gift of imagination, and can pro- 
ject himself into the future a dozen years, or even less, the 
Isthmus becomes one of the most notable and interesting 
spots in all the world. If, on the other hand, he looks 
only at what he sees immediately around him, when he 
lands in Colon, he will declare it to be the most God-for- 
saken spot on the footstool of earth. 

These contradictions and contracts greet one at every 

34 



CONTEASTS IN THE CANAL ZONE 35 

turn, especially in Colon. De Lesseps' palaces crown the 
wind-swept point of Cristobal, where balmy breezes 
sweep the shore fresh from the salt sea at all hours of the 
day and night, while, scarcely a stone's throw away, over 
the line in Panamanian territory, are wretched huts in 
which no self-respecting American would shelter his 
swine. Two or three well -paved streets run the length of 
Colon, while a ^quarter of a block away the swamp, just 
being redeemed from the possession of the mosquito and 
the alligator, stops one's progress. In fact, only a few 
days ago, as I write, a young saurian, six feet long, was 
caught in the very middle of the town, as he was seeking 
his ancestral swamp, which later on he found, though in 
the process of transformation. 

'' So much to do," says the pessimist ; "so much al- 
ready done," answers the optimist. " A miserable, ma- 
larial ditch," says the pessimist ; "a magnificent canal in 
the making," retorts the optimist. 

I find that the views of residents and visitors are di- 
vided somewhat on national lines. The Britisher and 
the anglomaniac are still quite sure that the canal will 
come to no good end, or, to speak more exactly, though 
it may have two good ends, these ends will never be con- 
nected by a good middle channel. The English captain 
of the steamer that took us from New York, gravely in- 
formed me that "the canal would never be built." In- 
deed, he was cocksure of his position, and was willing to 
defend it in a lengthy argument. Other Englishmen 
shake their heads gravely, and talk about " colossal mis- 
take, " " enormous graft, " " the danger of the dam giving 
way and flooding Colon," etc. The American, on the 
other hand, and many optimistic Britons whom I met, 
scout an this, and inform us cheerily that failure is im- 
possible, that enough has been done already to demon- 
strate the wisdom of the plans adopted, and that, in ten 



36 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

years, or at the most twelve, the largest ships in the 
world will be steaming through the widest, deepest, and 
most important ditch ever dug by man. 

I cannot claim to be unprejudiced ; but if I could take 
the position of an impartial observer from another planet, 
from Mars, for instance, where they know so much about 
canals, I am confident that even then I should lean 
strongly towards the optimistic side. 

K one looks at the vastness of the undertaking, only 
yet in its infancy, he may get discouraged. If he con- 
siders what has already been accomplished, under adverse 
circumstances of climate and Congress, he is willing to 
believe that nothing is impossible. 

At any rate, * ' the pestilence that walketh in dark- 
ness" and the fever that wasteth at noonday have been 
largely overcome, and that means that the battle is more 
than half- won. Two years ago, Colon was one of the 
worst death-holes in the world. Yellow fever, malaria, 
and often smallpox, stalked across the Isthmus. The 
undrained swamps which hemmed in Colon on all sides, 
and through which some of the streets ran, bred the 
pestilent mosquito by the billion, and any one who un- 
dertook to live there took his life in his hand. 

Now, by comparison, Colon might be called a health- 
resort. There has not been a well-defined case of "yellow 
Jack " for nearly eighteen months, and not even a "sus- 
pect" for nine months. Malaria is steadily decreasing 
and becoming less virulent. The mosquito is foiled by 
the wire screens that meet him everywhere, even as he 
attempts to enter some of the humbler houses, while the 
ditches and drain-tiles are completing his discomfiture, 
and the one and only winged spirit of evil that carries 
these dread diseases is retiring farther and farther into 
his native swamps. 

Colon has by no means a bad climate. Every traveller 



CONTEASTS IN THE CAJfJfAL ZONE 37 

is surprised at the coolness and freshness of the air in the 
dry season. The sea breeze blows all day long, and 
every day. Of course, it is hot in the sun and out of the 
breeze, as always in the tropics, but turn a corner, where 
the wind can strike you, stand under the shade of a 
towering cocoanut, and you are soon almost too cool, and 
you begin to say that the climate of the Isthmus has been 
outrageously maligned. To be sure, I am writing about 
the Isthmus as it is in the month of February, but several 
Americans who have lived here the year round have told 
me that they have suffered more from the heat in New 
York and Philadelphia than they ever did in Colon. 

So the problem in the Isthmus is not how to change the 
climate, which might prove a large contract even for 
Americans, but how to drain the swamps and outwit the 
mosquitoes, and this, as I have said, has already been 
largely accomplished. It was the pestiferous and elusive 
mosquito that defeated the French in their attempts to 
dig the canal, and even Napoleon's armies could not have 
stood against them. There were corruption and graft and 
extravagance, almost beyond belief, during the French 
occupation ; but in spite of these adverse forces the canal 
would probably have been built before this if the 
mosquito had not been present. But the French did not 
know how to contend with him, and he slaughtered their 
forces of diggers by the ten thousand. Now that the 
health of the zone has been established and demonstrated, 
only colossal corruption and mismanagement can prevent 
the completion of the canal. 

In still other ways have we profited by the mistakes of 
the French. For instance, they built their great wooden 
palaces, administration buildings, and workmen's houses 
on the ground, and these erections the ants attacked and 
soon demolished, or greatly weakened their foundations. 
The Americans have raised the old buildings, and built 



38 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

the new ones, on brick or cement piles, which the ants 
cannot consume. 

The extravagance, too, of "the De Lesseps gang" is 
constantly before the eyes of every one in Colon, in the 
shape of the huge wooden palaces built for the elder De 
Lesseps and his son on their brief visits to the canal, as 
well as in the mountains of useless and absolutely unused 
machinery which were accumulated in Colon, and at 
which the teeth of time and rust have been gnawing for 
years, until now they are almost utterly destroyed. The 
palaces have been converted into ofi&ces for the Isthmian 
Canal Commission, and the monuments of useless ma- 
chinery and worthless stores ought to warn our officials 
how not to do it. 

After all, if we have received no material consideration 
for the forty millions of dollars we paid to the French 
company, the experience, and the warnings they left us 
of how not to do it, should be worth the money. 

The contrast of Colon and Panama of to-day and the 
Colon and Panama of even a year ago also gives rise to 
many of the contradictions which appear in the public 
press, and to the confusion of American ideas. We re- 
member the man who could not lie about Chicago, be- 
cause it grew so fast that it kept ahead of his prevarica- 
tions, do the best he could. So it is difficult to keep up 
with the changes in these Panamanian cities since Uncle 
Sam began to dig the canal in good earnest. " Old 
residents," who took up their abode in these cities a 
year ago, tell me that they hardly know the towns to-day 
as the same ones they remember twelve months ago. 

Then, the streets of Colon were a mass of reeking mud. 
Now, several are very respectably paved or macadamized, 
and on a dozen others workmen are engaged, so that 
every passing week makes a very decided difference in 
the highways of the city. The same is true of the build- 



CONTEASTS IN THE CANAL ZONE 39 

ings which are going up in many sections of the native 
city of Colon. To-day a swamp, the next day a paved 
street, the day after a four story wooden building, is 
only a little exaggeration of the facts. Of course, many 
of these buildings are the flimsiest of jerry-built houses ; 
but they afford shelter, at an enormously high rent, until 
something better and more substantial can be provided, 
for a population in Colon that is growing by leaps and 
bounds. 

In Panama, the same improvements are being made, 
though Panama, being an older and more substantial 
city, does not show the same lightning transformation 
scenes. Yet here, scarcely eighteen months ago, there 
was not a paved street in aU the city. The roads were 
full of pitfalls and stumbling-blocks, and whether a man 
was dead or alive, whether a mendicant or a millionaire, 
the cab driver "rattled his bones over the stones," like 
Hood's pauper "whom nobody owns." Now all the 
principal streets are paved with brick, and well-paved, 
too, and are far more comfortable for the foot or carriage 
passenger than are many of the streets of New York or 
Boston. 

All along the line of the railway from Colon to Pan- 
ama, neat villages have sprung up almost in a night. 
There are more boom towns in the forty-eight miles of 
that short railway than anywhere else in the world in the 
same distance. And these boom towns will continue to 
boom, for they have come to stay, at least until the canal 
is finished, since each one was planted to meet a distinct 
need by experienced and far-sighted officials. 

These sudden transformations account, as I have said, 
for many conflicting reports. Month before last, some 
visitor to the Canal Zone might have written with truth 
of a dismal, malaria-br^eeding swamp, fit only for the 
residence of mosquitoes and alligators. Month after next, 



40 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

another visitor, writing of the same place, might tell of a 
thriving colony, of happy homes, of a free public school 
attended by diligent children, and of the local habitation 
of all kinds of progressive American ideas. And both 
writers would be telling the truth. 

Another thing that impresses the visitor to the Isthmus 
is the enormous scale on which everything is undertaken. 
It is one of the world's biggest undertakings, and it is 
provided for on the largest scale. There is a steamer 
direct from New York, unloading great flat freight cars 
for carrying dirt from the cuts. A foreman is checking 
them off when they are swung up by the huge derrick, 
as he might check so many bunches of bananas. He 
tells us that they are a part of a consignment of a 
thousand flat cars which they cannot get fast enough from 
the States, though there were thousands of such cars on 
the Isthmus before. Portable houses, or material for 
houses are ordered by the hundred, stores of all kinds 
by the million dollars' worth ; cranes, derricks, dredging 
machines, steam shovels that can dig away a small moun- 
tain in a month, are some of the equipment which one 
sees on every side. Everything is on the biggest and 
most powerful scale. The puny little French engines 
that one sees, some of them in use and some of them cast 
aside, look like children's toys compared with the great 
moguls that are hauling the dirt away from places where 
it is not wanted and dumping it where it is wanted. 

On our journey from Colon to Panama, I passed gravel 
train after gravel train carrying the dirt to the dump. A 
friend told me that he stood at one station for three hours 
and, during that time, a long, loaded gravel train passed 
every ten minutes — all of which proves that canal dirt is 
flying, and flying at a tremendous rate already. 

Mr. Stevens, the exceedingly efficient and able engineer 
who then controlled the destiny of the canal, told me that 




A STEAM SHOVEL AT WORK ON THE CANAL. 




CULEBRA CUT. PART OF THE OLD FRENCH EXCAVATION. 



CONTBASTS IN THE CANAL ZONE 41 

in February, 1907, the soil was being excavated at a rate 
twice as great as on the very busiest month of the French 
occupation. Their record month was 340, 000 cubic yards 
of excavation. The month of February saw 700,000 
cubic yards taken out, and in March 800,000 yards would 
be excavated, and even then the expected limit had not 
been reached by any means. 

Thirty thousand men are now employed in different 
capacities ; 4,000 carpenters and builders ; 3,000 digging 
drains and laying pipes for sanitary purposes, etc., etc. 
These figures are difficult to comprehend, but when one 
goes up and down the line as I have done more than once, 
he sees that this enormous army of knights of the spade and 
hammer are actually at work and bringing things to pass. 

I have spoken of the worthless French machinery, dis- 
carded engines, boilers, derricks, etc., but the officials 
have been at pains to explain to me that this machinery 
was the best that could be obtained at the time. It has 
been superseded and rendered worthless, simply by the 
great advances in mechanical engineering and labour-sav- 
ing machinery within the last twenty years. Impossibil- 
ities have become possible within that period. 

The difficulty now is not to dig out the soil and rock, 
but to dispose of it afterwards ; this is, however, being 
overcome, though it means the laying of miles and miles 
of new track, and the vast enlargement of all the railway 
rolling stock. 

All these preparations and accomplishments impress 
the beholder with the tremendous energy and determina- 
tion with which the big job has been undertaken, and 
give him confidence that it will be successfully com- 
pleted. It seems as if the energy of our strenuous Presi- 
dent, to whom the canal project is so dear, had been in- 
fused into the managers and heads of departments all 
along the line. 



42 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

As most of my readers know, the problem now is not 
to dig a wide, deep ditch, but to form two great lakes 
more than thirty miles long and eighty feet deep in the 
deepest part, and to build dams strong enough to retain 
this enormous body of water ; so that we must adjust our- 
selves to another contradiction of old-time ideas, and try 
to imagine that canal-making in the Zone is not so much 
ditch-digging as lake-making, with two comparatively 
short canals at either end. 

There is no more interesting place in the world to-day 
than the Canal Zone, there are few healthier places, there 
are good steamers to bring visitors here, and one good 
hotel at least at the Panama end where they may stay, 
and there is no reason why thousands of Americans 
should not come and see for themselves how Uncle Sam 
spends their money in making the canal, to which every 
man, woman and child in the Union will have to con- 
tribute at least three dollars before the first steamer goes 
through, and before the Atlantic and Pacific oceans are 
forever wedded. 



V 

THE REPUBLIC OF COLOMBIA 

The Two Front Doors of Colombia— A Remote Capital— Why Colombia 
Interests North Americans — An Empire in Resources — How the 
Pope Divided Up South America — Nunez de Balboa and His Great 
Journey— The Chibchas and Their Civilization — A History of Revo- 
lutions—Bogota's Civilization— The Separation of Panama. 

THE Eepublic of Colombia is scarcely " the gem 
of the ocean," but she has interesting peculiar- 
ities that belong to none of the other South 
American states. She is the only republic of the ten that 
lies on both the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. She has two 
front doors, so to speak, one facing the north and the 
other the west, while the Isthmus of Panama, which used 
to be hers, divides her Atlantic and Pacific possessions. 

But, though Colombia has two ample front doors, the 
entry ways which lead from them to the chiefly inhabited 
portion of her house, to carry out the figure, are narrow 
and tortuous and almost impassable. For the coasts are 
often swampy and malarial, or else covered with such 
dense, matted and rain-soaked vegetation that it is diffi- 
cult to force a road through it to the high table-lands 
where lie Colombia's fertile and thickly populated plains, 
and where her capital, Bogotd, is situated. 

It is the only country in the world whose capital is so 
isolated that it can exert but slight political influence 
upon the outlying provinces, which, for much of her in- 
dependent history, have been in more or less open revolt. 
'; When, recently, Panama desired to separate from the 
mother country, and set up her own lares and penates, it 
was easier for the United States, England, or France to 
land marines to preserve order in the Canal Zone than 

43 



44 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

for Colombia to get the handful of troops at her disposal 
into the rebellious territory, though she had to send only 
from Cartagena, while if she had dispatched regiments 
overland from Bogota, as was insanely proposed, it would 
have meant weeks of hopeless scrambling through an al- 
most impenetrable jungle. No wonder that she made a 
virtue of necessity, and let Panama " gang her ain gait." 

Chiefly Colombia has been of interest to us in North 
America, not because of her vast extent, her undeveloped 
resources, her mines of gold, and her wealth of forests, 
but because in the division of the nations that little nar- 
row, but vastly important strip of territory called the 
Isthmus of Panama was included within her bounds. 

That coveted zone, ten miles wide, which will soon 
afford a waterway between the oceans, is really worth to 
the civilized world all the rest of Colombia, and indeed a 
dozen similar republics rolled in one. 

Colombia has stood in the way of progress and modern 
civilization. The canal will promote them, as no similar 
waterway in the world has ever done. Colombia has the 
superstition, the ignorance, and the priestcraft, of the 
middle ages. The canal will bring the latest ideas and 
inventions of the progressive west to the darkest and 
most backward sections of the east. 

And, doubtless, in these blessings Colombia will herself 
share, and will perhaps come to count that her best day 
when Panama slipped off her yoke, and made it possible 
for the United States to inaugurate the greatest piece of 
modern engineering which the world has yet seen. 

After all, Colombia is an empire in herself, if an unde- 
veloped empire, — she too is a part of the great continent 
of possibilities, even since stripped of Panama, she con- 
tains nearly 500, 000 square miles and is one-sixth of the 
size of the United States outside of Alaska. A country 
as big as ten Pennsylvanias, full of undeveloped gold 



THE EEPUBLIO OF COLOMBIA 45 

mines, even though, hundreds of millions of the precious 
metal have already been won within her borders ; a coun- 
try abounding in precious woods and tropical fruits ; 
a country of fine river courses and lofty mountains and 
noble plateaux ; a country which possesses every variety of 
climate, from the intensely tropical to the mildly temper- 
ate, where white men can live as happily as in any 
portion of the world, cannot be without a future, however 
checkered her past has been. 

Colombia, like most South American countries, has 
been cursed by her religion and her politics. When the 
Pope divided all South America between Spain and 
Portugal, he gave what was not his to give ; but his edict 
made it possible for these powers to fasten upon one-sev- 
enth of the earth's surface all that was reactionary and 
mediaeval in church and state, to keep these countries in 
bondage for three hundred years. The writhings and 
spasms of the last hundred years have broken the polit- 
ical yoke, and in some measure the religious yoke, but 
there have been as yet in Colombia no years of well- 
ordered freedom which could bring peace and plenty to 
this distracted country. 

The early history of Colombia is one of the most inter- 
esting of all the South American republics. The great 
Columbus landed on her shores on his third voyage. 
Cartagena, on the Atlantic coast, is the oldest fortress in 
all America. The illustrious Balboa started from one of 
her ports on his famous expedition which nearly multi- 
plied by two the world's knowledge of geography. 

It was an epoch-making journey, — that which Nunez 
de Balboa made into the interior from the Atlantic coast 
in 1511, — a very short journey, to be sure, and without 
any immediate results, but there he learned from an 
Indian chief that only twoscore miles farther south was 
a great sea on whose coast dwelt great and rich nations. 



46 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

Two years later, starting from Antigua, he headed an 
expedition to see whether or not the Indian chief was 
telling the truth. Engaged in that expedition was the 
wonderful general, administrator, hero and scoundrel, 
Francisco Pizarro. The Spaniards pushed their way 
through the malarial swamps and the almost impenetrable 
jungles, until, at last, they approached a line of hills 
from which the Indians told them they could see the un- 
discovered ocean. Balboa hurried on and outstripped 
his men, and was the first to feast his eyes upon the great 
and wide ocean, the Pacific ; but Pizarro and Alonzo 
Martin rushed for the water, and were the first to allow 
the cool waves to lave their tired feet. 

What a moment that was in the history of the world ! 
The discovery meant Peru and the whole west South 
American coast ; it meant California and the northwest, 
and eventually China and Japan, added to our geograph- 
ical knowledge. It meant immense additions to the do- 
main and wealth of Spain. It meant cruelties intoler- 
able and bloodshed inconceivable. It meant revolution 
and counter-revolution, and political blasting and mil- 
dew. All this in four hundred years. What it may 
mean of regeneration and reconstruction and upbuilding 
and civilization, the next four hundred years will tell ; 
but I have the largest hopes, for South America has 
turned the lowest corner of her downward road some dec- 
ades ago, and is on the up grade. On this road may her 
progress never be stayed ! 

Colombia, however, has shared but little as yet in this 
upward progress, by reason in part of her difficult geo- 
graphical position, which has placed her temperate and 
most largely peopled section so far in the interior and 
made it so inaccessible to the coast. " Weeks of the 
most difficult journeying are required to get to the sea- 
coast from Bogotd, or to any of the other states of 




SOME NATIVE PANAMANIANS. 



THE EBPUBLIC OF COLOMBIA 47 

Colombia, and Panama might as well be on tbe other side 
of the globe, so far as practical communication goes," 
says Mr. Dawson. 

Very early in her history, the Spaniards, lured on by 
gold, made their way to the healthful table-lands in the 
interior, and there Quesada, their leader, established his 
capital on the site of the ancient Chibcha city. The 
Chibchas were a large nation of a very considerable de- 
gree of civilization. They made cotton cloth, mined the 
precious metals and emeralds, used money as a circulat- 
ing medium ; lived in houses ; built splendid temples ; es- 
tablished a very effective form of government, — in fact, 
in many lines of civilization, were scarcely inferior to the 
Incas or Aztecs. But they had no military organization 
or genius, and 200 Spaniards soon conquered them and 
reduced them to vassalage. 

The next three centuries were centuries of rapacity and 
oppression, of bloodshed and revolt and stern reprisals. 
We cannot follow their wearisome years in detail. At 
last, the people awoke to a sense of their rights and their 
wrongs. The ferment of the French Eevolution began to 
work in far-off and backward Colombia. The troubles 
of Spain in the Napoleonic wars gave the people their 
opportunity, and in 1808 the series of revolts began which, 
at last, under Bolivar, gave Colombia and the other 
republics their so-called freedom, or, at least, transferred 
the location of their tyrants from Spain to their own 
shores, and gave them "grafters" of their own nation, 
instead of foreign oppressors, to batten on the national 
necessities. 

The history of the last hundred years has been a his- 
tory of revolutions, new constitutions, and the constant 
swinging of the pendulum from extreme republicanism 
to dictatorship, and back again, but often, at both ex- 
tremes, with a set of rapacious and corrupt rulers in 



48 THE CONTII^ENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

power. Presidents and cabinet officers, who have been 
personally honest and who have desired better things for 
Colombia, have been handicapped by lack of power to 
inaugurate reforms, by the inertness of the people, and 
by the desperate condition of the finances of the country. 

Bolivar plunged the country hopelessly in debt at the 
very beginning of her independent national life, by reck- 
lessly borrowing money for his mercenary troops and for 
his navy. Dishonesty and continued reckless borrowing 
increased this debt, until it amounted to thirty-five mil- 
lions of dollars. After the separation of Venezuela and 
Ecuador from Colombia, each country nominally assumed 
its proportionate part of the debt, which, in Colombia's 
case, has been repeatedly scaled down, and even the in- 
terest has scarcely been paid. 

Yet, in spite of debts, bad government, and revolutions, 
Colombia remains a state great in territory and enor- 
mously rich in natural products. The gold it contains 
alone would make it rich, if intelligently mined and con- 
served. Along the river banks it is said you find *' pay 
dirt" everywhere, and cannot wash the soil of these 
banks at any point without finding '' colour." Since the 
Spanish conquest, more than three-quarters of a billion 
dollars' worth of the yellow metal have been taken out of 
Colombia, and the mines are still far from being ex- 
hausted. 

Bogotd, the capital, is a city of 120,000 inhabitants, 
and is the literary and intellectual, as well as the polit- 
ical centre of the country. It has an American-installed 
street railway and system of electric lights, and a library 
of 50,000 volumes. The Spanish spoken in Bogota is 
said to be particularly pure, and she has contributed 
more perhaps to the literature of South America than any 
other one centre. 

The event in Colombian history of most interest to Amer- 



THE EEPUBLIC OF COLOMBIA 49 

ican readers was the last revolt of Panama, already al- 
luded to, which sep^ated that province from the rest of 
Colombia, and made it possible for the United States to 
dig the great canal. I have called it '^ the last revolt," 
for Panama has been in a chronic state of secession for 
hundreds of years. At times her connection with far-off 
and inaccessible Bogotd was merely nominal ; at other 
times she was held in absolute and rasping vassalage, 
which galled her spirits and tempted her to constant ef- 
forts to break away from Colombia. 

In 1885 ''the very delegates who nominally represented 
her in the constitutional convention were residents of 
Bogota, appointed by President !Nunez ; military rule be- 
came a permanent thing on the Isthmus ; all of&cials 
were strangers sent from the Andean plateau ; and the 
million dollars of taxes wrung each year from the people 
of Panama were spent on maintaining the soldiers who 
kept them in subjection." 

One of the periodical revolts of Panama occurred in 
1895, but it was premature and ill-managed, and was 
speedily put down by the Colombian troops. A much 
more formidable rebellion broke out in 1899 and resulted 
in a three years' civil war, in which 30,000 men were 
slain. No wonder then that the Panamanians were all 
ready to take advantage of the hitch in negotiations be- 
tween the United States and the Colombian governments, 
when the corrupt officials at Bogota held out for more 
than the ten million dollars offered for the canal rights, 
and threatened to hinder, if not prevent, the eventual 
building of the canal through Panama. 

Then came Panama's golden opportunity, and she 
seized it by declaring her independence. The new re- 
public of Panama was proclaimed November 3, 1903. 
All the resident inhabitants were practically in favour of 
the new republic, whose interests were entirely bound up 



50 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

with the canal. The prompt recognition of Panama by 
the United States, ten days later, and by France fifteen 
days later, prevented Colombia from repeating the bloody 
scenes of 1899-1902, and made it possible to build the 
canal, which wiU vastly promote the progress, unifica- 
tion and civilization of the world. 

Colombia lost her opportunity and deserved to do so. 
The United States never acted more justly or righteously, 
in view of the rights of Panama or her own rights, or of 
the larger needs of mankind, than in recognizing the new 
republic and foiling the designs of a selfish oligarchy in 
Bogotd. 



VI 

ECUADOR, THE REPUBLIC OF THE EQUATOR 

A Country Named for a Parallel of Latitude— Interesting Features of 
Ecuador — The Guayas Eiver — Guayaquil, Ecuador's Capital — Its 
Great Trade — Ecuador's Table-Land — Her Ancient Kings— The Com- 
ing of Pizarro — The Spanish Kule — Ecuador's Later Career — Some 
of Her Presidents — Her Many Revolutions — An American Eailway 
to Quito— The Dawning of a Better Day. 

ECUADOR is the only country in the world named 
for an imaginary line, a parallel of latitude. 
But it is an appropriate name, for the equator 
bisects it, and it lies on both sides of the zero line of lati- 
tude, though largely to the south, with its capital, Quito, 
nearly on the line itself. 

If it is named for an imaginary line, it is by no means 
an imaginary country, but a very substantial and a very 
rich land, which might develop enormously if only the 
curse of priestcraft and the twin curse of petty politics 
were removed. 

Many interesting features distinguish Ecuador from 
her sister and neighbouring republics. On the way 
south it is the last of the well-watered countries on the 
west coast. The line between Ecuador and Peru is prac- 
tically the line between the rain belt and the arid region 
which is so characteristic of most of the Pacific coast of 
South America, where the cold Antarctic current on its 
way north prevents the precipitation of moisture in the 
form of rain. On the coast of Ecuador, on the contrary, 
the people enjoy too much, rather than too little rain, 
and Guayaquil, the chief port, is one of the wettest cities 
in the world, while the country immediately behind it is 
often under water during the rainy season. 

51 



52 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

The high table-lands of the interior are, on the whole, 
the best parts of Ecuador, enjoying a temperate and 
springlike climate, where people can live in comfort even 
on the equator, the year around. 

The sail up the Guayas, Ecuador's great river, is most 
enjoyable. At its mouth it widens out into a vast bay 
sixty miles across, at the entrance to which is the island 
of Puno, where Pizarro landed to fit out his expedition 
for the conquest of Peru. For forty miles up this great 
river, the largest on the western coast of South America, 
we steam, before we reach Guayaquil. The heavily- 
wooded shores on either side always are kept green by 
the over-abundant rains. Here and there the forests give 
place to verdant meadows that pasture hundreds of cattle, 
and that look from the distance like the polders of 
Holland. 

As I write these words I am sitting on a steamer's deck 
detained for days by quarantine regulations three miles 
below the city of Guayaquil which looks imposing and 
picturesque in the distance, with the twin white turrets 
of its churches and its red-tiled houses climbing two com- 
manding green hills which are surmounted by forts. Be- 
tween these hills nestles a great hospital, the most neces- 
sary building in all the city, for Guayaquil is a notoriously 
unhealthy place. Yellow fever is almost always epidemic, 
and no wonder. ''I have visited many of the death- 
holes of the world," says a globe traveller, ''but I have 
yet to find one whose unsanitary condition equals that of 
Guayaquil." 

My own experience in many lands justifies this sweep- 
ing condemnation, and yet Guayaquil might easily be 
made as healthy as Havana or Panama, if only a 
Colonel Waring or a Colonel Gorgas could take hold of 
it. It could readily be drained, and, even without 
sewerage, the yellow fever could be stamped out, as 



BCUADOE 63 

Colonel Gorgas, who has saved Cuba and the Isthmus 
from the pest, told me, if only the people would cover 
their rain-water barrels with mosquito-proof cloth, and 
see that no holes got in the cloth, — an almost impossible 
condition to enforce upon 20,000 rain-water barrels where 
mosquitoes find congenial breeding-places. 

If Guayaquil looks picturesque from a distance, it must 
be confessed that it is largely distance that lends enchant- 
ment to the view, and a near approach is most disillusion- 
ing. Its streets are slimy and dirty, its houses unsub- 
stantial in appearance but suitable to the earthquake 
belt, for they are built of timbers and bamboo laths so 
joined together, that, even in a severe quake they sway 
and creak but do not tumble down. 

Nevertheless this unsubstantial and unsanitary city has 
a large and growing trade. More than ten millions of 
dollars' worth of imports yearly enter Guayaquil from 
Europe and the United States, and there is an almost 
equally large export trade in coffee, hides, cocoa and 
rubber, for there are few richer coasts in all IsTorth and 
South America than the back country of Guayaquil. 

As I write, vast quantities of water weeds, sensitive 
plants, orchids and grasses, and now and then a big log 
go floating by our steamer, borne on the swift current to 
the sea. When the tide turns some of these floating 
Islands will drift back again, emblematic of the trade 
that floats back and forth from all the world through the 
great Guayas estuary. 

But Guayaquil, though the chief port of the country, 
is by no means Ecuador, or the most interesting part of 
Ecuador, for that lies back on the table-lands, a hundred 
miles from the coast. This has always been the chief 
centre of population and has always contained the po- 
litical capital of the country. Quito is half as high again 
as Denver, and, from its eyrie, a mile and a-half in the 



54 THE CONTINGENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

air, looks down on the capital of every other country in 
the world except that of the sister republic of Bolivia. 

Two lines of high mountains stretch through the table- 
lands of Ecuador from north to south, and between these 
lies a comparatively level plateau some forty miles in 
width, and from six thousand to ten thousand feet or 
more above the sea. This table-land is subdivided by 
other ranges of hills running east and west, called rendos 
or knots, that cut the plateau into eight great sections, 
so that the table-lands of Ecuador have been compared to 
a huge ladder, of which the rendos are the rungs and the 
two ranges of Andes the side pieces. Quito lies in the 
second of the eight sub-plateaux, counting from the north, 
and is thus much nearer to Bogota, the capital of Co- 
lombia, than to Lima, the capital of the sister republic 
on the south. 

All this vast and temperate plateau, where Indian corn 
and the potato were indigenous, and where wheat and 
barley, introduced from Europe, flourish, was occupied 
in the days before the Spanish conquest by the Caras, a 
nation much like the Incas, but less warlike and less well 
disciplined. Their civilization, however, was of a similar 
character. They possessed large cities, carried agri- 
culture to a high degree of perfection, and for 400 years 
had been governed by a line of kings, called Shiris. 
The fourteenth Shiri, Hualcopo, became king in 1430, 
and was the last but one of the native Caras who ruled 
this interesting race, for during his reign the Incas from 
the south made war upon them, and in the reign of his 
son Cacha, the fifteenth and last Shiri, the conquest of 
the Incas was completed and the Shiri was slain. 

History now moves rapidly in the Quito empire. 
Huaina Capac, the Great, the Inca general who finally 
conquered the Caras, settled down in his conquered prov- 
inces, married the daughter of the last Shiri, and ruled 



ECUADOE 65 

as liis legitimate successor. But tlie rule of tlie Incas in 
Ecuador was not to be a long one, for the second Inca 
emperor, Atahuallpa, began to reign in 1525, a fateful 
period for Ecuador and Peru, for Caras and Incas alike, 
since, even then, the Spaniards were beginning to make 
their cruel and bloodthirsty way down the west coast of 
South America. 

In 1524 the notorious Pizarro made his first unsuccess- 
ful trip from Panama in a small vessel which had been 
built by Balboa. But his resources were inadequate, and 
he soon put back to Panama. The next year, in 1525, 
the very year that Atahuallpa began to reign in Ecuador, 
Pizarro headed a larger expedition and sailed down the 
coast of Colombia, almost reaching the northern border 
of Ecuador. Here he found some natives coming north 
on a great seagoing raft laden with cloth, silver work, 
metal mirrors and other goods. All these things whetted 
the avaricious appetite of Pizarro, but he was not yet 
strong enough to undertake the conquest of these highly 
civilized races of which the raftsmen told him, and again 
he paused, sending his lieutenant, Almagro, back for a 
larger force. 

There is a rare plot for an old Greek tragedy in the 
fateful way in which Inca and Spaniard, unknown to 
each other, were coming each to meet the other, to settle 
very soon in bloody conflict the destiny of a continent. 
The Inca from the south had overwhelmed the Caras, the 
Spaniard from the north was coming down to overwhelm 
the Inca and wrest from him his hard- won victory. 

While Pizarro was waiting for reinforcements and 
making his first ineffectual voyages, Atahuallpa, the 
Inca conqueror of Ecuador, and his brother Huascar, who 
had been given the southern kingdom of Peru, were wag- 
ing a sanguine, fratricidal war, weakening their own 
forces, and, unconsciously preparing the way for the 



66 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

easier conquest of the Spaniard. In this seven years' 
war Atahuallpa, his troops under the command of the 
famous general Quizquiz, was completely successful, his 
brother Huascar was captured, and the emperor started 
south for Cajamarca, just beyond the Ecuadorian border, 
to assume rule over the whole Inca empire, when he 
heard a startling piece of news. 

If he could have understood its full significance it 
would have seemed still more startling. It was no other 
than that 200 men with pale faces and huge animals of 
which they sometimes seemed to form a part, and with 
tubes in their hands that belched out fire and death, had 
landed on his shores, and were making their way inland. 

The treacherous capture and dastardly murder of 
Atahuallpa belong to the history of Peru rather than 
that of Ecuador, and we need not linger over the story 
here longer than to say that the strategy and magnificent 
generalship of the perfidious Pizarro were entirely suc- 
cessful, and the Spanish yoke was firmly fastened on the 
necks of the Ecuadorians for nearly 300 years. 

The Spanish rule is a monotonous tale of oppression, 
intrigue and petty disputes among the conquerors them- 
selves. The people of Ecuador were practically en- 
slaved, though as this is largely an agricultural country, 
the common people suffered less from their conquerors 
than the poor natives of Peru, who were forced to make 
the daily tale of bricks without straw, and to furnish 
gold and silver to satisfy the rapacious cupidity of their 
conquerors. 

The troubles of Spain in the early part of the nine- 
teenth century, and the rise of Bolivar of Venezuela as 
a commanding figure, gave the people of Ecuador their 
opportunity for independence, which they were not slow 
to embrace, and after many defeats and set-backs they 
finally achieved it under General Sucr^, the great patriot 



ECUADOR 57 

general, in a decisive battle fought on the 24th of May, 
1822. 

At first, and for a few years, Ecuador was incorporated 
into the Eepublic of Colombia, but the union was a forced 
and distasteful one, and in 1835 under her able President 
Eocafuerte, she achieved a separate national existence, 
which in spite of many revolutions and counter revolu- 
tions, she has maintained ever since. 

There have been few outstanding names in Ecuador's 
modern history that the world cares to preserve. Besides 
President Eocafuerte, Flores, a capable but unscrupulous 
general who made himself president and plunged the 
country into unnecessary war, may be mentioned, and 
President Moreno who strove hard and with partial suc- 
cess to bring order out of chaos in the decade and a half 
between 1860 and 1875. In the latter year, Moreno, who 
was still in power, was deliberately assassinated in the 
public square of Quito. 

Since then it has been the old monotonous story of 
civil war and usurpation and dictatorship and plots and 
counter plots. The last ten years seem to give promise 
of better things, and to show that Ecuador like her sister 
republics, to the south, is getting tired of revolutions 
which result in no beneficent evolution. She is still, 
however, one of the most backward of the South Ameri- 
can states, in spite of her magnificent resources and 
splendid situation in the rain belt of the continent, and 
with her unequalled harbour of Guayaquil from which to 
ship her products to all the world. 

Because the Ecuadorians have given more attention to 
politics than to commerce, to revolutionary cabals than 
to steady industry, this country, as large as half a dozen 
New Englands, does not produce as much wealth as a 
single second class New England city. In its cocoa alone 
it has a source of inexhaustible riches. Of this staple. 



58 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

Ecuador produces more than any other country, while 
rubber, sugar cane, tropical fruits of all kinds and 
beautiful woods of every sort, add to her exportable 
wealth. 

But the better day is dawning. American enterprise 
is building a railway from Guayaquil to Quito, which 
will soon be completed, and will connect this ancient and 
historic city of the Incas and the Caras with the outside 
world upon which in her sleepy isolation and from her 
lofty height she has so long looked down. Then Quito 
will no longer be " a hundred years behind the moon," 
as the people of Guayaquil say. The fresh breezes of 
modern civilization, too, will doubtless blow away some 
of the cobwebs of priestcraft and superstition which must 
be dissipated before Ecuador can take her rightful place 
among the advanced nations of the world. Now Quito is 
sometimes called "the little mother of the Pope" and 
every fourth person you meet, it is said, is a priest or a 
nun or an ecclesiastic of some sort. 

The railroad is a great civilizer. The Bible is making 
its way through the persistent efforts of the colporteurs 
of the British and Foreign Bible Society into the moun- 
tain fastnesses. The Protestant missionary will go with 
the Protestant Bible, and Ecuador will yet be redeemed 
from its four centuries of oppression, revolution and un- 
rest. 



VII 

CURIOSITIES OF TRAVEL ON THE WEST COAST 

The Steamers, the Cargoes, the People— Distances and Fares— Comfort- 
able Cabins — ^A Floating Market — Cows, Pigs and Fowls — From Hot to 
Cold — From Wet to Dry — What the Natives Have to Sell — Panama 
Hats — Birds Above and Fish Below — An Entertaining Journey for a 
Naturalist. 

TEAVELLIl^G on the west coast of South 
America is different in many respects from 
travelling in any other part of the world. The 
steamers are different ; the cargo is different ; the people 
are different ; the food is mdifferent — but that is another 
story. 

The two principal lines, the Pacific Steam Navigation 
Company, a British concern, and a line belonging to the 
Chileans, have pooled their issues, and eliminated com- 
petition, so that the usual results have followed — high 
fares, poor fare, and slow transit. 

The distance between Panama and Valparaiso is con- 
siderably less than that between New York and Liver- 
pool ; but the time consumed in making the journey is 
four times as great, and the ticket costs nearly four times 
as much. 

The fare from Panama to Guayaquil is $99, for a dis- 
tance less than eight hundred miles, or more than twelve 
cents a mile. To Valparaiso the fare is $220, or eight 
cents a mile, while the average rate for steamer travel is 
not more than two or three cents a mile. 

To be sure, by buying a round-trip ticket from New 
York back to New York the fares can be averaged up so as 

69 



60 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITT 

to make the cost tolerably reasonable ; but before any con- 
siderable passenger traffic can be expected on the west 
coast of South America the local fares must be reduced 
to much lower figures. 

"When one considers what he gets for his money, the 
disproportion in price seems still more unreasonable, for 
food which would hardly be served to third-class pas- 
sengers on Atlantic steamers, is the best that the first- 
class passengers on the west coast can expect. 

Stale bread ; stale butter that runs like salve and is 
strong enough, according to the ancient witticism, to 
"go alone and speak for itself" ; a condensed abomina- 
tion instead of milk fresh from the cow ; a limited supply 
of ice, which lasts only half way down the coast ; a 
family ice-chest for a large steamer, instead of a cold- 
storage room ; leathery meat and antiquated, skinny 
chickens, these are some of the things that people who 
pay twelve cents a mile for their passage money must ex- 
pect to get for it on the west coast. 

But this is the disagreeable side, which we will dispose 
of first, and then turn to the silver side of the cloud, for 
travelling certainly has such a side, even on the west 
coast of South America. 

The boats are built for hot weather, and the staterooms 
are large and airy, and usually not too full, until one 
nears Valparaiso when they are often scandalously over- 
crowded. To be sure, they often have occupants that are 
not put down on the passenger list, occupants that would 
put an American housewife to shame ; and it is also true 
that in some ports, especially Guayaquil, the mosquitoes 
are almost unbearable, and no screens are furnished for 
window or bed. But travellers must expect to be 
troubled with "such small deer" in tropical countries. 

On the whole, the cabins are comfortable and clean, 
the officers friendly and obliging, and the decks roomy. 



TEAYELS ON THE WEST COAST 61 

and if the passenger makes up his mind to the heat and 
the inevitable discomforts of the tropics, he can pass a 
fairly cheerful four weeks on the voyage from Panama 
to Valparaiso. 

Our steamer itself is a constant source of interest that 
never palls. Most steamers are built to carry freight and 
passengers only; the Cruatemala, like the other west- 
coast craft, besides being a common carrier of freight and 
passengers, is a floating market, a floating hennery, a 
floating stockyard, and slaughter-house, and a floating 
aviary as well. 

Go to the upper deck, and you will hear the crowing 
of cocks, the cackling of hens, and the quacking of 
ducks, while the occasional gobble of a turkey will lend 
variety to the chorus. 

Go below, and you will hear the lowing of cows and 
the grunting of pigs ; and on certain days the butcher 
will take the lives of some of these innocents, and will 
truss them up on the deck below, just under your state- 
room, and leave them hanging there to cool for hours, in 
plain sight of all the passengers. 

The aviary department of our ship is always an inter- 
esting one, for the feathered tribe is represented in great 
variety. Parrots and paroquets are in the majority, for 
they are found everywhere along these shores, and are 
brought for sale on board in large numbers by the natives. 
Many passengers yield to their blandishments, and carry 
home a parrot or two. Besides, we carry other birds in 
large numbers ; canaries from Chile, redbirds from Peru, 
and an occasional long-legged bird something like a crane 
that hops solemnly along the deck, inviting the passengers 
to scratch the back of its neck, for which attention it 
seems genuinely grateful. 

The most interesting feature of our steamer is the 
travelling market, which I venture to think, on the 



62 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

scale on which it is here developed, is peculiar to the 
west coast of South America. The after part of our ship 
has large deck space running from rail to rail, clear 
across the ship on two decks, which at first seemed to me 
an admirable place for the passengers to enjoy a prom- 
enade. 

I soon found, however, that it was not for us, but for 
the traders to whom the space had been sold at a high 
price. Soon after leaving Panama these traders began to 
divide it up into sections, with rough boards, and at 
Guayaquil they took on board thousands of bunches of 
bananas, and hundreds of thousands of oranges, and tons 
of mangoes, limes and green vegetables, which they ex- 
pected to sell to the inhabitants of the twenty or more 
towns at which the steamer will stop on its way to 
Valparaiso. 

Soon after leaving Guayaquil, where rain falls in tor- 
rents, where everything is green and all tropical plants 
grow in lush luxuriance, we come to the dry belt of 
South America, where practically it never rains. At 
noon of one day the ship will steam out of the bay of 
Guayaquil in a pouring tropical shower, during which, 
perhaps, an inch of rain will fall in an hour. At mid- 
night of the same day it will pass a point on the Peruvian 
shore close to the Ecuadorian border where it has not 
rained for sixteen years and may not rain for sixteen 
years to come. 

This sudden transition is explained by some as due to 
the cold Antarctic current, which here and for hundreds 
of miles south strikes the coast of South America, pre- 
venting the formation of moisture by congealing the air. 
The result, which naturally comes with the absence of 
rain and the impossibility of irrigation, is the complete 
lack of vegetation ; and every orange and banana, every 
potato and plantain and cabbage, must be brought from 



TEAVELS ON THE WEST COAST 63 

the interior, or else down the coast in these trading- 
steamers. This accounts for the large market on our 
ship and for the thriving business in fruit and vegetables 
which our floating traders carry on. 

But the trading is not altogether a one-sided affair. 
The people from the shore have something to sell, though 
it must be confessed it is often a rather pitiable little 
assortment of goods. There is a woman with a mangy 
parrot tied to her by a string about the parrot's neck, 
which every now and then brings the poor bird up with 
a sudden jerk when he wanders a little too far. 

There is another with a small collection of mother-of- 
pearl shells, which she offers to us for ten times their real 
value. 

A man with a monkey near by is showing off his 
tricks, while another one offers us an ant-eater, a gentle 
little creature with appealing eyes, an extraordinarily 
long nose, and a large bump of curiosity. He wanders 
about, poking his nose into unexplored corners so far as 
his tether will allow him to go. This ant-eater is about 
the size of a small cat, and has a long ringed tail, some- 
thing like an opossum's. 

But the chief articles of sale which merchants from the 
shore have to offer in Ecuador and northern Peru are 
Panama hats, which, by the way, are not made in 
Panama, and cannot be bought in Panama except at ex- 
travagant prices. But in Guayaquil, and Payta, the first 
large town in Peru on the north, are the native homes of 
the Panama hats, and here the hatters swarm on board 
with hats of all sizes and prices. 

But do not think you can pick up a bargain for a few 
dimes. ''Genuine Panamas" may be sold in the New 
York or Chicago stores for two dollars apiece ; but, when 
you get to Guayaquil, where they are made, you will find 
that hats of any quality will cost from ten dollars to two 



64 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

hundred dollars in silver, or half as much in gold, ac- 
cording to the fineness of the material and the quality of 
the "weave." 

The average price for a fine hat is perhaps thirty dol- 
lars in silver, but three times that sum is asked for hats 
of extraordinary texture. We are told that they are 
woven by hand under water, and that some of the finest 
kinds represent a year's labour. 

For weary days and nights after leaving the shores of 
Ecuador we steam by unbroken deserts, the white waves 
breaking on whitish-gray rocks, while gaunt, dry, tree- 
less hills rise behind the cliffs. Gulls and graceful alba- 
trosses follow our ship, and occasional porpoises come 
lunging at us from the sea, or lead our course, by rang- 
ing themselves like so many horses at our prow, and 
swimming without any apparent effort, for miles, within 
a few feet of our iron keel, always keeping at the same 
distance. 

As we approach the Guano islands animal life of all 
kinds increases at a wonderful rate. The sea swarms 
with fish, porpoises, seals and sea lions. Clouds of birds, 
ducks, divers, gulls, loons, fill the air, occasionally dark- 
ening the sun, and extending in unbroken columns 
through the air for miles. Sometimes they go fishing 
with one accord, and millions of them swoop down upon 
their unsuspecting finny prey, which are breaking the 
water in every direction, while the islands near by are 
black with the birds that have gorged themselves until 
they can eat no more. It is a most entrancing journey 
for a student of natural history. 

At the various stopping-places on this harbourless 
coast swarthy Spanish-speaking passengers in gay attire, 
the men affecting particularly gaudy neckties and waist- 
coats, join our ship ; and thus, with the traders in the 



TEAVELS ON THE WEST COAST 65 

rear, our fellow passengers on tlie forward deck, the gulls 
and albatrosses in the air, and the porpoises in the sea, 
the tedium of the long voyage is mitigated, as we slowly 
make our way towards the tropic of Capricorn. 



vin 

THE EMPIRE OF THE INC AS 

A Fascinating History— sThe Vast Territory of the Incas— Their Origin— 
Humboldt's Impression of the Andes — Nature in Her Sterner As- 
pects — The Irrigation Works of the Incas— Their Beautiful Fabrics — 
Their Wonderful Buildings — The Magnificent Ruins of Cuzco — The 
Luxurious Gardens of the Emperors — The Common People — Social- 
Ism Tempered with Despotism — The Incas and the Japanese — The 
Great Temple at Cuzco — Contrasts and Contradictions. 

THE ancient history of Peru is so unique and fas- 
cinating that in any book dealing with South 
America it deserves a chapter to itself. Indeed, 
modern South America can scarcely be understood with- 
out reference to the great race which so long dominated 
its western coast, and whose descendants to-day far out- 
number all the other races put together. 

The empire of the Incas stretched along the Pacific 
coast for nearly 3,000 miles, embracing the territory to- 
day claimed by Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Chile and a part 
of the Argentine republic. Its breadth was more inde- 
terminate, for its eastern border straggled off into the un- 
explored Amazonian regions, occupied by savage races, 
which were never thoroughly subdued by the Incas. ' 

The origin of the Incas, like that of most great conquer- 
ing races, is lost in the shadows of antiquity, and in order 
to make their origin and ancestors more impressive, they 
themselves ascribed the beginnings of their nation to the 
gods from whom their rulers had descended in unbroken 
succession. Without going into their fantastic my- 

* The word Inca is here employed, according to the common usage, 
as referring to the Peruvian people, throngh strictly speaking it applies 
only to their rulers. ' 

66 




THE THRONE OF THE ANCIENT INCAS. 




MODERN DESCENDANTS OP INCAS. 



THE EMPIEE OF THE INCAS 67 

thology it is sufficient for us to know that at the time of 
the Spanish conquest they had defeated the almost equally 
civilized nations of the north, the Caras, who lived on the 
table-lands of Ecuador, and were monarchs of all they 
surveyed, from the second degree north of the equator to 
the thirty-seventh degree south. They were the Eomau 
conquerors of the new world. Their world was a limited 
one, like that of the Eomans, but all that they knew was 
theirs, and it was no mean empire. 

''So immense is the scale on which nature works in 
these regions," says Humboldt, ''that it is only when 
viewed from a great distance that the spectator can in 
any degree comprehend the relation of the several parts 
to the stupendous whole. Few of the works of Nature 
indeed are calculated to produce impressions of higher 
sublimity than the aspect of this coast, as it is gradually 
unfolded to the eye of the mariner sailing on the distant 
waters of the Pacific ; where mountain is seen to rise 
above mountain, and Chimborazo, with its glorious 
canopy of snow, glittering far above the cloud crowns 
the whole as with a celestial diadem." 

Yet, as the modern traveller views the coast of the 
Incas, while Humboldt's glowing words are all true of the 
magnificent scenery, no country could seem to be less 
fitted for the development of a great agricultural nation, 
such as the Peruvians preeminently were. Barren league 
succeeds barren league, from a point just south of the 
equator for thousands of miles farther south. Dreary, 
brown, sunburned shores, where it practically never rains, 
rise gradually to bare, forbidding, inaccessible peaks a 
few miles from the shore. Travelling hills of sand sweep 
over the plains of the interior swallowing up highways 
and cultivated fields alike, and it would seem that a more 
inhospitable coast was never picked out for the abode of 
man. 



68 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITT 

Nevertheless, as the hardiest races have always flour- 
ished where nature presents the unkindest obstacles, as 
old England and New England and Holland and Scan- 
dinavia prove, so ancient Peru was no exception to the 
rule, and here, on her plateaux, was developed a race, 
the most wonderful of modern times, which had never 
come in contact with European civilization. Their irri- 
gated gardens, their terraced rice-fields, their vast aque- 
ducts, their splendid roads, their great cities and magnif- 
icent temples, seem all the more wonderful when we con- 
sider the obstacles they had to overcome in developing 
their empire. 

Long before any modern government thought of insti- 
tuting a department of agriculture, the Incas had theirs 
organized. Five hundred years before our government 
turned its attention seriously to irrigating our desert 
land, the Incas had built great sluices, and aqueducts of 
stone slabs neatly fitted together, one of which was nearly 
five hundred miles in length, and conveyed water for 
millions of acres of thirsty ground along all its course. 
In another case a solid mountain was tunnelled through to 
provide for the overflow of a lake that sometimes inun- 
dated its shores, thus using the dangerous surplus water 
for desert land that needed it. 

The honour put upon agricultural pursuits was most 
extraordinary, for they were recognized, as they truly 
are, as at the basis of all national prosperity. At one of 
the great annual festivals the Inca himself, the mighty 
potentate of this vast empire, the descendant of the gods, 
attended by his court in royal state, and in the presence 
of a vast concourse of people, turned up the earth with 
a golden plow, "thus consecrating the occupation of the 
husbandman, as one worthy to be followed by the Chil- 
dren of the Sun." 

If agriculture was the basis of their civilization, the 



THE EMPIEE OF THE INCAS 69 

Peruvians did not despise manufactures, in which, they 
were almost equally proficient, though their wants were 
simple and the variety of their manufactures few, as com- 
pared with those of our own more complicated modern 
life. But what they did manufacture was often made 
with an exquisite fineness which would put to shame our 
machine-made shoddy. 

Their vicufias, or long-wooled sheep, afforded a splen- 
did staple for the finest cloth, which often had almost the 
fineness and lustre of silk, while the colours with which 
they dyed their cloth were the despair of European fac- 
tories. In the molding of clay into beautiful and fan- 
tastic pottery, in the polishing of metal and stone mir- 
rors, the fashioning of copper utensils and tools, and the 
making of gold and silver ornaments, the ancient Peru- 
vians were most expert. Their weapons were bows and 
arrows, spears and swords, and so perfect were they in 
tempering copper, mixed with a small amount of tin (a 
lost art, and one never rediscovered by Europeans) that 
their tools had a razor edge scarcely surpassed by the 
finest modern steel, though they knew nothing of iron or 
its products. 

But it is when we come to their vast and substantial 
buildings that we are most amazed. How a primitive 
race without iron tools, without modern quarrying and 
hoisting machinery, could have constructed such cities, 
such palaces and such temples, is almost beyond explana- 
tion. Their ruins rank with the pyramids and the ruins 
of Karnac for grandeur and extent. The city of Cuzco, 
the capital of the empire, occupied a commanding situa- 
tion on the high plateau where all their larger cities were 
built. It was defended by a great fortress on a rugged 
eminence to the north of the city, as well situated and as 
strongly defended, apparently, as the castle of Edinburgh. 
This fortress was connected by underground passages 



70 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

with the city and the palaces of the Incas, whither the 
rulers and the people could escape in time of siege. 

The fortress and galleries were built of solid blocks 
of stone, so nicely adjusted that though no cement was 
used it was ''impossible to introduce even the blade of 
a knife between them." These stones were measured by 
an ancient Spanish writer, who declares that some of 
them were fully thirty-eight feet long, by eighteen broad, 
and six feet thick. "We are filled with astonishment," 
says Prescott, " when we consider that these enormous 
masses were hewn from their native bed, and fashioned 
into shape by a people ignorant of the use of iron ; that 
they were brought from quarries from four to fifteen 
leagues distant, without the aid of beasts of burden ; were 
transported across rivers and ravines, were raised to their 
elevated position on the sierra, and finally adjusted there 
with the nicest accuracy, without the knowledge of tools 
and machinery familiar to Europeans." 

If the Incas of high degree built magnificent fortresses, 
aqueducts and roads, they also indulged in gardens and 
summer palaces that were as exquisite as the former were 
grand in their proportions. Yucay, the favourite resi- 
dence of the ruling Incas, about twenty miles from the 
capital, was an illustration of a luxurious palace and play- 
ground which the Csesars themselves could hardly have 
surpassed. 

To quote again from Prescott, to whose magnum opus 
all subsequent writers on Peru are indebted : " Here (to 
Yucay) when wearied with the toil and dust of the city, 
they (the emperors) loved to retreat and solace them- 
selves with the society of their favourite concubines, wan- 
dering amidst groves and airy gardens that shed around 
their soft intoxicating odours and lulled the senses to 
voluptuous repose. Here, too, they loved to indulge in 
the luxury of their baths, replenished by streams of 



THE EMPIRE OF THE INCAS 71 

crystal water whicli were conducted through subterrane- 
ous silver channels into basins of gold. The spacious gar- 
dens were stocked with numerous varieties of plants and 
flowers that grew without effort in this temperate region 
of the tropics while parterres of a more extraordinary 
kind were planted by their side, glowing with the various 
forms of vegetable life skillfully imitated in gold and sil- 
ver. ... If this dazzling picture staggers the faith 
of the reader, he may reflect that the Peruvian moun- 
tains teemed with gold ; that the natives understood the 
art of working the mines to a considerable extent ; that 
none of the ore was converted into coin, and that the 
whole of it passed into the hands of the sovereign for his 
own exclusive benefit whether for purposes of utility or 
ornament." 

But what about the common people in this vast empire 
of luxury and wealth ? Alas ! they shared but little in 
the comforts and none at all in the luxury of their rulers. 
Most interesting in view of modern socialistic ideas is the 
story of the Inca state from the standpoint of the common 
people. From many points of view they exemplified the 
tenets of the extreme socialist. Among them there was 
no wealth and no poverty, at least no suffering. There 
was no private ownership and no corporate greed, if we 
except the greed of the Incas and their families. All the 
people possessed all things in common and there was " no 
private ownership of public utilities" or of any other 
kind of utilities. 

The state looked after the people with a jealous eye, 
from the day they were born to the day they died. The 
state prescribed where they should live, what they should 
wear, what they should eat, whom they should marry. 
The state owned all their time, and as they had no cur- 
rency and few exchangeable commodities, the people paid 
for everything with their time. 



72 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

It was socialism tempered with despotism, or des- 
potism tempered with socialism, but withal a most benev- 
olent despotism, which looked after every man, woman 
and child in all Incadom, as a kind farmer would look 
after his fat cattle and hogs and choice poultry, and, it 
must be confessed, from much the same motive. 

For at least four hundred years the empire thus built 
up existed, and waxed stronger and stronger, and had it 
not been for the advent of the Spaniards, no one can tell 
that it might not have embraced the whole of South Amer- 
ica within its domains, and advanced northward, until it 
came in contact with the equally marvellous civilization 
of the Aztecs of Mexico. 

It cannot truly be said that the common people were 
rebellious or even restive under this rule. In fact, so far 
as history records their views, they were among the most 
contented of peoples ; hardworking, industrious, un- 
imaginative, fully believing that their Inca was a descend- 
ant of the sun, that he had a right to command their time 
and demand their service. 

All products of farm or loom were divided into three 
classes, one third of which belonged to the Inca, another 
third to the Sun (i. e., to the elaborate ceremonial worship 
of which the Sun was the centre, — in other words, to their 
religion) while the remainder, which was often the small- 
est third, was for the sustenance of the common people, 
though, in times of famine, and distress, part of the por- 
tion of grain that went to the Inca came back to the 
common people from his benevolent (?) hand. 

Eeligion was doubtless used by the emperor of Peru as 
the chief factor to keep their subjects in a proper and 
submissive frame of mind. Since the emperor was a 
direct descendant of the gods and shared the godlike 
nature, nothing that he could ask of his people was too 
great and nothing could be unreasonable. Among the 



THE EMPIRE OF THE INCAS 73 

Japanese of to-day we find the only modern prototype of 
the lucas, and there we find but a feeble reflection, for 
though their emperor is all but divine, and their religion 
is patriotism, the modern spirit has so permeated the 
Japanese people and emperor alike, that he would be 
very unlikely to make unreasonable demands of his loyal 
subjects. 

Since their religion was the state, and the state was 
their religion, we are not surprised to read of temples of 
unparallelled magnificence among the ancient Incas. To 
the one supreme ruler of the universe, the invisible God, 
of whom they seemed to have some just but vague ideas, 
the Peruvians never erected any temple. He could not 
be worshipped in a temple made with hands, but to the 
sun, whose worship was especially dear to them, they 
erected innumerable temples, and also to the moon, ''his 
sister wife," and to the stars, especially to Venus known 
to them by the name of Chasca, or the "youth with the 
long and curling locks." They also consecrated temples 
to the Thunder and Lightning and to the Eainbow, but 
the Sun received their chief homage, and to him were 
dedicated their most gorgeous temples. 

The most magnificent of these was built at Cuzco. The 
exterior was massive and substantial in the extreme, and 
a Spaniard who saw it in its best estate declared that 
" only two edifices in all Spain could be compared with 
it." But the interior of the temple, we are told, was the 
most worthy of admiration. " It was literally a mine of 
gold. On the western wall was emblazoned a representa- 
tion of the deity, consisting of a human countenance look- 
ing forth from amidst innumerable rays of light which 
emanated from it in every direction, in the same manner 
as the sun is often personified by us. The figure was 
engraved on a massive plate of gold of enormous dimen- 
sions, thickly powdered with emeralds and precious 



74 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

stones. . . . Gold, in the figurative language of the 
people, was ' the tears wept by the sun,' and every part 
of the interior glowed with burnished plates and studs of 
the precious metal. The cornices which surrounded the 
walls of the sanctuary were of the same costly material, 
and a broad belt or frieze of gold let into the stone work, 
encompassed the whole exterior of the edifice." * 

A strange, contradictory people indeed were these 
ancient Peruvians ; a people of a high and yet a low civili- 
zation ; a nation of socialists ruled by a despot ; a nation, 
with palaces and temples but without a literature; a 
nation of skillful agriculturists and artificers who yet 
were willing to pay two -thirds of their earnings into the 
coffers of the state and church ; a nation without an 
alphabet and who preserved their records and their 
accurate census returns on knotted cords, and yet who 
had made discoveries in metallurgy and mechanics whose 
lost secret no one can discover to-day ; a people contented 
with poverty in the sight of luxury ; who were willing to 
drudge for their Inca and defend him with their lives, in 
return for a poor pittance which insured them against 
starvation and nakedness ; a people always willing to 
work, who yet asked little personal return for their 
labours ; a people willing to be lost in the state and to be 
effaced individually for the good of the nation, and at the 
will of the emperor. 

How different is the dominant nation of the western 
hemisphere to-day ! There individualism prevails and 
the nation is the slave of the people. There the people 
rule, nominally at least, and the rulers are their servants. 
There in religion, art, business, politics, the individual 
carves out his own destiny, and his father's traditions or 
his ruler's wishes have very little to do with the matter. 

The contrast is interesting and instructive, and the 
* Presoott's "Conquest of Peru." 



THE EMPIEE OF THE INCAS 75 

future historian may teacli many a lesson, and draw many 
a moral from the United States of North America, as we 
can to-day from the states of South America when they 
were united under the rule of the Incas. 



IX 

PERU, YESTERDAY AND TO-DAY 

The Bloody History of Peru— The Spanish Conquest— The Rule of the 
Inca Emperors — Pizarro's Conquest— ^A Room Full of Gold — Plzar- 
ro's Perfldy — He Quarrels with Almagro — The Hard Lot of the 
Peruvians — The Benefits of the Spanish Occupation — Modern Peru 
— Peru's Heroic Figures- President Castilla's Administration — The 
War with Chile— Heroic Admiral Grau— The Provinces Captured— 
Peru's Later Prosperity. 

AS the history of Peru under her ancient rulers, 
the Incas, is the most interesting of any South 
American country, so modern Peru, since the 
advent of the Spaniards, is checkered with more of the 
lights and shadows which make history fascinating, than 
any of the other modern republics. If it is true that 
"happy is that country that makes no history," Peru is 
indeed a most unhappy country, for almost every decade 
for the last four hundred years has been reddened with 
bloody history, racked by revolutions, made detestable 
by outrageous oppression, or stained by almost unbe- 
lievable carnage. 

In each of these centuries some heroic figures have 
emerged from the general welter and chaos. At last the 
country, having learned in the hard school of experience 
the pathway to true national prosperity, seems to be pur- 
suing it with even tread. 

The story of the conquest by the Spaniards, though ab- 
sorbing in its interest, has been told too often to be dwelt 
upon at length in these narrow limits. Everything, at 
first, seemed to conspire to make it possible and com- 
paratively easy for the Spaniards to conquer and overrun 
Peru and to overthrow the ancient dynasty of the Incas. 

76 



PEEU, YESTEEDAY AND TO-DAY 77 

The clock of the Incas' doom had struck. Perhaps the 
cup of their iniquities was full, and Providence requited 
them for their cruelties and centuries of injustice, by 
sending upon them a foe more cruel and unjust than 
they. 

Authorities differ, to be sure, as to the character of the 
Inca emperors, but we have reason to believe that they 
were not the mild and benevolent despots they are some 
times represented. At any rate, Atahuallpa, the Inca 
who ruled at the advent of Pizarro into New World poli- 
tics, had treated his brother shamefully, had slain tens 
of thousands of his enemies in his lust for power, and, 
for years, like his ancestors before him, had forced enor- 
mous tribute from the common people who were prac- 
tically all his slaves. So our sympathy for the last of 
the Incas is less than it otherwise would be, when we 
read how Pizarro trapped him in one of his own cities, 
took advantage of his hospitality to capture him while 
he was offering the Spaniard the freedom of his country 
and the food and succour they needed. 

That was a decisive moment in the history of the world. 
It practically gave Spain a new continent, placed in her 
hands the balance of power, and altered the age-long 
civilization of South America. 

Pizarro always knew how to follow up his victories. 
"When once he had captured the emperor, he never al- 
lowed him to get out of his hands, and by that bold 
stroke the little handful of Spaniards, armed with the 
terrible might of gunpowder, had conquered a nation in 
spite of its armies and its wealth. 

Their great chief, the son of the sun-god captured, the 
spirit seemed to go out of the poor Peruvians, and in the 
scripture phrase, " they became as dead men." Not that 
there were not battles and skirmishes and bloodshed in- 
credible, before th§ conquest was complete, but Pizarro' s 



78 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

success after that first bold stroke of capturing the person 
of the Inca, never seemed to be in doubt. 

Another most dramatic incident, and one that showed 
the dominant motive of the conquerors in a lurid light, 
was the offer of Atahuallpa, who evidently knew his man, 
of a room full of gold for his release. ''I will fill this 
room with gold as high as I can reach, if only you will 
liberate me, ' ' was his piteous plea. Few rulers have ever 
lived who could fulfill such a promise or furnish such a 
ransom, but Atahuallpa was one of the few. 

The room was seventeen feet long by twenty wide, and 
the point to which Pizarro reached, for he was a tall man, 
was nine feet from the floor. Here he made a red line on 
the wall, and held his captive to the contract. The 
country was ransacked for gold in every direction. The 
golden plates were torn from the beautiful temple of 
Cuzco, of which I have already told ; golden cups and 
vases and shields were brought in from every quarter, 
until at last the great room was filled, and treasure, to 
the value of $22,000,000 in gold, an enormous sum to-day, 
but representing five times the value in those days of 
cheap products, was given over to the rapacious Span- 
iards. One-fifth of it was sent to the royal treasury, the 
rest was divided among the victors, making even every 
common soldier rich. 

Then came one of the crowning acts of perfidy in the 
world's history. Even then, when Atahuallpa had lived 
up religiously to his part of the bargain, he was not re- 
leased. He had stripped his temples and palaces in vain, 
and his subjects had impoverished themselves for naught, 
for, after a mock trial on a trumped-up charge of treason 
to Spain, the great Inca was slain, and the dynasty of the 
Incas was at an end. 

But they who take the sword shall perish by the sword. 
This proverb was never more fearfully illustrated than 



PEEU, YESTEEDAY AND TO-DAY 79 



by the story of Pizarro and his comrades in arms, few of 
whom died natural deaths. Their great leader himself, 
years afterwards, was entrapped very much as he had en- 
trapped the Inca, and was treacherously slain by those to 
whom he had been doing a kindness. He died stabbed 
to the heart, while he made the sign of the cross upon the 
floor which he kissed, murmuring with his dying breath 
the name of ''Jesus." A vein of superstitious religion 
ran through this dominating character, and with all his 
vices he was courageous, resourceful, not unkindly in his 
natural disposition, and as true to his friends as he was 
savage, treacherous and fierce towards his enemies. 

For nearly three hundred years after the death of 
Atahuallpa, the story of Peru is the story of quarrels 
among the Spanish conquerors, of civil strife, of battle 
and bloodshed, and also of consistent and unremitting 
oppression of the natives. First, Pizarro and his great 
lieutenant, Almagro, fell out and fought for the su- 
premacy. Pizarro won, as usual, and Almagro was exe- 
cuted. After Pizarro' s death his brothers, who were 
scarcely less able, and no less brave than he, took up his 
quarrels and continued his carnage. 

During all these years the poor Peruvians were ground 
between the upper and the nether millstones. When the 
Spaniards came, they are supposed to have numbered 
some forty millions, though other careful authorities re- 
duce that estimate one-half. In 1575, fifty years after 
Pizarro' s coming, but 8,000,000 could be found in the 
land, and after two centuries of Spanish rule the popula- 
tion of Peru proper had fallen to 1,500,000. 

Such a wholesale decimation of a people, all because of 
the cursed greed for gold, can hardly be matched in 
modern or ancient times. The country was impoverished 
as well as depopulated. " As time went on," says Daw- 
son, "new taxes were devised, until it seemed the de- 



80 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

liberate purpose of the Spanish government to transfer 
all the gold and silver in Peru's mountains to the royal 
treasury. Not only were both imports and exports 
taxed, but also every pound of provisions sold in the 
markets and shops. One-fifth of the products of the 
mines and one-tenth of the crops went directly to the 
Crown. All kinds of business had to pay licenses ; 
quicksilver and tobacco were monopolies ; and ofiB.ces 
were regularly sold to the highest bidder." 

A pathetic saying is recorded of one of the Inca chiefs 
who had maintained a precarious independence in the 
wilderness, when he was called upon at last, after a fruit- 
less resistance, to swear allegiance to the Spanish crown. 
Lifting the gilded fringe of the table-cloth on which he 
had signed the document renouncing his rights, he said : 
*' All this cloth and its fringe were mine, and now they 
give me a thread of it for my sustenance and that of all 
my house." 

That there were some compensations for this wholesale 
ravishment of life and liberty cannot be denied when 
we consider the future of the continent as a whole. It 
has been well said: "The Spanish occupation brought 
many incontestible benefits to South America. To say 
nothing of the civilized system of jurisprudence, the let- 
ters and the religion which have made the peoples of the 
continent members of the great western European family, 
the introduction of new and valuable animals, grains and 
fruits, raised the average of well-being among the re- 
maining inhabitants. Horses, asses, cattle, sheep, goats, 
pigs, chickens, pigeons, wheat, barley, oats, rice, olives, 
grapes, oranges, sugar-cane, apples, peaches, and even the 
banana and cocoa-palm were introduced by the Spaniards. 
In return, Europe owes to Peru maize, potatoes, choco- 
late, tobacco, cassava, ipecacuanha and quinine." 

The introduction of the Jgst named drug is of interest 



PEEU, YESTEEDAY AKD TO-DAY 81 

to every man, woman and child who has had to taste 
its bitter virtues. The Countess of Chinchon, the wife of 
the viceroy was, like Peter's wife's mother, "sick of a 
fever." But she had no believing apostle to take her by 
the hand and raise her up. Instead, a Jesuit missionary 
from the mountain wilds of southern Ecuador sent her a 
strange kind of bark, which, when administered, quickly 
cured the viceroy's wife of her fever, and when Linneseus 
came to name the tree which produced this wonderful 
bark, he called it "chinchona," in honour of the viceroy 
whose wife it had cured. 

The history of modern Peru begins as does that of all 
the other South American republics, except Brazil, with 
the brief overthrow of the Spanish dynasty by Napoleon 
in the early part of the last century. To be sure, Peru 
being the principal seat of Spanish government and 
Spanish officials in the new world, maintained her al- 
legiance to the mother country longer than the countries 
to the north, but the same ferment was working all over 
the continent, and in 1824, after many reverses and 
partial victories, the Spanish power was finally broken 
by the patriots and Peru started on her independent 
career. 

In the years since, some heroic figures stand out in 
Peru's history worthy of a place in the roll-call of the 
heroes of any land. San Martin, one of the earliest and 
ablest generals of the revolution, seems to have been a 
true man and a genuine patriot, more solicitous for his 
country's welfare than for his own. He was an Argen- 
tine who fought the battles of Peru, but when Bolivar 
joined him with his victorious forces he found that the 
''Liberator" was bound not so much to free Peru, as to 
become himself the dictator of all South America. 

Desiring no part or lot in such a scheme of self-aggran- 
dizement, San Martin returned to his own country, leav- 



82 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

ing Bolivar and General Sucre, another exceedingly able 
general, to finish the war for freedom. On the 9th of 
September, 1824, was fought the battle of Ayacucho, the 
decisive struggle which gave Peru her liberty. * ' Soldiers, 
on your deeds this day depends the fate of South 
America," cried Sucr6 on that eventful morning, and the 
exclamation was no empty rhetoric, declaimed to put 
heart into his men. Inspired by the thought, the patriots 
fought desperately, the Spaniards were utterly defeated, 
the viceroy himself was wounded and made a prisoner, 
and Spanish power was forever broken. Callao castle 
held out for thirteen months longer, and ^' with its sur- 
render was hauled down the last Spanish ensign which 
floated on the South American mainland." 

In the later history of Peru, President Castilla's admin- 
istration was one of the most brilliant and successful. 
Castilla rose to power by his own virtues and strength of 
character from the ranks of the soldiery, and for more 
than twenty years, from 1844 to 1866, was a power in the 
land. He has been called the Porfirio Diaz of Peru, and 
he seems to have dealt justly an^ loved mercy, and, as 
we may hope, walked humbly before his God. At any 
rate. Providence, in his day, threw untold riches in the 
lap of Peru, for the guano and nitrate beds were discov- 
ered, or at least became important factors in the world's 
commerce. Castilla used the vast wealth which flowed 
from these deposits wisely in paying the interest on the 
national debt, and increasing the credit of his country, 
instead of squandering it on a swarm of useless office 
holders, and it looked as though Peru had started on a 
career of unbroken prosperity. 

But alas ! the same causes which brought her prosperity 
well nigh compassed her ruin. Prosperity gave rise to 
speculation, and reckless expenditure, as it too often has 
done in our own country, and when the firm, wise hand 



PEEU, YESTEEDAY AKD TO-DAY 83 

of Castilla was removed, no one else was found who could 
guide the ship of state with equal skill. The foreign 
debt was increased most recklessly, from $25,000,000 to 
$250,000,000, until two-thirds of the gross revenues of the 
country could hardly pay the interest on it. 

The struggle with bankruptcy continued for years, and 
to add to the woes of Peru, Chile casta covetous eye upon 
the nitrate beds and guano islands, which had become 
the chief source of Peru's wealth, and resolved to have 
them or at least some of them, for her own. She set up a 
claim to the southern portion of the nitrate beds which 
had always been claimed by Bolivia. The Bolivians 
were unable to resist the encroachments of the vigorous 
and aggressive Chileans, and, in trying to defend her 
rights, drew Peru into the conflict, which she was the 
more willing to enter, as her own vast nitrate deposits 
were in danger of falling into the hands of Chile. 

The war proved disastrous to both the allies, for Bolivia 
lost all her coast line, and Peru was humiliated and im- 
poverished, and victorious Chile dictated her hard terms 
of peace in Lima itself. The command of the sea gave 
the conquering nation the key to the situation. It could 
hardly be otherwise on such a barren and inaccessible 
coast as that of Peru, where garrisons and cities could 
easily be cut off from the source of supplies. Peru's re- 
sources had been exhausted in her mad speculations, and 
she could not buy the necessary ironclads to meet Chile's 
small but formidable navy. 

At first the fortunes of war were not so uneven. Peru's 
sailors and soldiers were equally brave as those of her 
enemy, and in Admiral Grau she had the greatest naval 
commander whom the war developed. Like two op- 
ponents at checkers, each of the contending nations had 
two good ironclads ; — two men in the king row. One of 
Peru's "kings," the Independencia, ran upon a rock and 



84 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

was lost early iu the war. This was the beginniDg of 
Peru's final defeat. But Admiral Grau, with his re- 
maining ironclad, the famous Huascar, performed prod- 
igies of valour, inflicted great losses upon the enemy, un- 
til, at last, his gallant ship was caught between two of the 
Chilean squadrons, and cut to pieces, while the admiral 
himself was blown into fragments by a shell while bravely 
directing the fight in the conning tower. 

This practically decided the war, though Peru kept up 
the hopeless struggle for many months. At last the 
Chileans entered Lima with their victorious army, com- 
pelled the Peruvians to pay a large indemnity, to give 
up half their guano islands and a large section of their 
nitrate provinces, with the provision that the provinces of 
Tacna and Arica were to be held by Chile for ten years, 
and at the end of that time a popular vote would decide 
who should retain them, the losing country to receive 
$10,000,000 from the other. The ten years' lease ex- 
pired long ago, but the question is still in dispute, and 
likely to be for years to come, until settled perhaps by 
another war. 

Since the war with Chile, Peru has passed through one 
frightful civil war in 1895, but for ten years now she has 
been at peace, and has been regathering and husbanding 
her dissipated resources. Though her debts have been 
largely repudiated or scaled down, her finances have been 
put on a sound footing, her currency placed on a gold 
basis, her vast resources which can never be wholly 
alienated while her ancient territory remains, are being 
developed and her railroads pushed farther and farther 
into the rich interior. Take it all in all, the sun of 
prosperity is shining upon the ancient land of the Incas 
as it has not for many a year, and we may hope that the 
twentieth century, begun so auspiciously, will be the best 
that Peru in all her varied history, has ever known. 



X 

PERU REDIVIVUS 
The Marvellous Recovery of the Great Inca State 

A Nation that is Hard to Kill — The Secret of Peru's Recovery — Her 
Great Resources — Her Delightful Climate — The Antarctic Current 
and its Benefits — What Lies Behind the Coast Desert — Secretary 
Root's Visit — A Peruvian Statesman's Speech — The Friendship of the 
United States and Peru — The Incident of the Lobos Islands — Lima, 
the Beautiful Capital of Peru — The Bones of Pizarro. 

SOME men do not know when they are beaten, and 
this is the secret of their ultimate success. Some 
nations are equally hard to kill, whatever their 
reverses and vicissitudes. Peru is one of these nations. 
She has had enough tribulation during the last four hun- 
dred years to blot out half a dozen ordinary nations, but 
she maintains her independence, and largely her ter- 
ritorial integrity, and is to-day entering upon a period of 
stable prosperity, unsurpassed in her history. 

Her Inca emperors were captured and treacherously 
killed by the Spaniards and her old civilization blotted 
out. Her temples were desecrated, her palaces despoiled, 
her public buildings were stripped of their gold and 
silver and jewels by the rapacious conquerors, her splen- 
did roads were allowed to fall into disrepair and become 
impassable. 

Then the Spaniards, in their turn, were dispossessed, 
eighty years ago, the country was again deluged in blood, 
business came to a standstill, and the struggle for liberty 
was long and exhausting. Eevolutidn succeeded revolu- 
tion, each time seemingly almost destroying the country 
when on the eve of a national revival. 

86 



86 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITT 

Then the Chileans sunk the Peruvian navy, as vre have 
said, sacked and burned her cities, wrenched from her 
two of her valuable states, Arica and Tacna, and robbed 
her of her nitrate beds and Guano Islands, her chief 
sources of wealth. 

From this great blow of the 70' s she was recovering, 
when the bloody revolution of 1895 broke out, and once 
more plunged the country in civil wars. 

But again she is on the high road to recovery and 
national vigour and health. Her credit is restored, her 
currency is on a substantial gold basis, gold and silver 
and copper coins are the only circulating mediums ; rail- 
roads are being pushed from the seacoast up into the 
rich interior at half a dozen different ports, Payta, Eten, 
Pacasmayo, MoUendo, and other places, as well as from 
Lima, American capital is pouring in, together with 
American engineers and American machinery ; Peru's 
inexhaustible copper and silver mines are being de- 
veloped ; her rubber forests are being explored ; her 
cotton, sugar and coffee are furnishing new revenues ; 
her capital, Lima, is being repaired, repaved and 
beautified, and, all things considered, there is not a more 
prosperous country in South America than this ancient 
empire of the lucas. 

The secret of Peru redivivus is a country of vast natural 
resources, an admirably healthy climate, an industrious 
and patriotic people, who never admit final defeat or are 
disheartened by any temporary trouble. 

The climate of Peru is a great surprise to many travel- 
lers, and most stay-at-homers, who are inclined to think 
of it as a hot, steamy country lying just under the 
Equator. Just under the Equator Peru does lie, but it 
is neither steamy nor unbearably hot, even in mid- 
summer. February found us in Peru, and February is 
considered the hottest summer month in this country, 



PEEU EEDIYIYUS 87 

but I have suffered far more in New York or Boston in 
August than in the corresponding month in Lima. The 
middle of the day is hot, but not unbearable ; the nights, 
the evenings and mornings are delightful, a good breeze 
blowing most of the time, day and night. Sunstrokes 
are unknown in Peru, and the dog has no day he calls 
his own in this land. While this is true on the coast, it 
is doubly true on the high table-lands which constitute a 
large portion of Peru, where heavy wraps and warm rugs 
and blankets are wanted even in midsummer. 

The reason for this excellent climate lies not only in 
the high altitude of the plateaux, but equally in the cold, 
antarctic current, a great ocean river, which flows up the 
whole length of Peruvian coast from the antarctic seas. 
This ocean current does exactly the reverse for the shores 
of South America of what the Gulf Stream does for 
Great Britain and Scandinavia. That stream warms the 
cold countries, this stream cools the hot countries. 

One has a tangible evidence of this when he jumps into 
his bath on the first morning after leaving the coast of 
Ecuador. If he is not prepared for the change, he is 
likely to jump out again with a shiver, for the water is at 
least twenty degrees colder than the day before. He is 
only five degrees south of the Equator, but the water in 
the bath-tub makes him think he is off the coast of Maine 
or at least on the north side of Cape Cod. 

The boon which this antarctic stream is to the dwellers 
on the Peruvian or Chilean coast of South America, it is 
hard to realize and impossible to exaggerate. The nights 
are cool, the days are comfortable, sleep is refreshing, the 
appetite revives, yellow fever is unknown of late years, 
and the general health of the people is excellent. Doubt- 
less much of the vigour, energy and irrepressible spirit 
of these people under difficulties is due to this beneficent 
river of the ocean. 



88 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

But a climate, however good, and people however 
euergetic, cannot make a nation great, that has not the 
natural resources out of which prosperity grows. But 
Peru has this third element of national prosperity abun- 
dantly. As one sails along the barren shores, from the 
edge of Ecuador to the northern boundary of Chile, one 
asks himself if even a condor can live on these bare moun- 
tains, and on this inhospitable, sand-swept coast ? For a 
thousand miles the coast of Peru presents this bold, 
grand, but unspeakably barren appearance. Magnificent 
mountains tower up towards the cloudless skies day after 
day as one pursues his slow way down the coast. Not a 
tree or a green bush can be descried ; but an oasis appar- 
ently in the interminable desert. What must Pizarro 
and Almagro and the early explorers have thought as 
they sought for a foothold in this new Eldorado ! Noth- 
ing more utterly discouraging can well be imagined than 
these desert mountains. 

But just behind them lay the wealth of the Incas, gold 
and silver incalculable, cojffee and cotton and spices and 
fruits and precious woods. So to-day the coast line pre- 
sents the same forbidding aspect, but this is only the 
desert fringe on the rich coverlet which overspreads 
Peru. Nowhere does the desert run back for more than 
eighty miles from the coast, and usually not so far. 
Even near the shore are river valleys which are wonder- 
fully fertile, and, wherever water touches the soil in this 
rainless region, vegetation springs up with amazing 
rapidity, and the desert is transformed into the garden of 
the gods. 

Then there is that long stretch of gradually rising 
plains, the foot-hills and then the great interior table- 
lauds with their incalculable riches. When we see in our 
mind's eye the real Peru and forget the dry and barren 
edge, we do not wonder at its recovery from the depths 



PEETJ EEDIVIYUS 89 

of the political and financial pit into which it has so often 
fallen. 

On the occasion of Secretary Boot's recent visit to 
Pern, the national assembly of commerce made the dis- 
tinguished visitor an honorary member of their body, 
and, in the course of the ceremony, Eev. Mr. Watson, 
a Scotch missionary in Lima, who was one of the speak- 
ers, well summarized the recent progress of Peru in the 
following words : 

"The present government of Peru is characterized by 
its eagerness to know the resources of its territory, so as 
to utilize them to the greatest advantage. This tendency 
is evident in the sending forth of technical commissions 
which are constantly employed. Now it is manifested in 
exploring the important mining centres, such as Cerro- 
de-Pasco, Huallanca and lea ; the petroleum fields of 
Tumbez, Payta and Piura; the magnetic iron districts 
of Aija ; the gold fields of Sandia and Carabaya, the 
borax fields of Azangaro, etc. . . . Studies have 
been made in the vineyard districts of Chincha and Mo- 
quegua, the sugar-cane regions of Chicama, the agricul- 
ture of Piura. . . . Irrigation works have been ini- 
tiated in almost all parts of the Eepublic. . . . 
Schools of agriculture and schools of arts and trades have 
been subsidized in various capitals of departments, and 
Peruvian professional men have been sent abroad at the 
expense of the state to complete their education." 

These sentences on this important occasion, from an 
educated and unprejudiced foreigner, put in succinct 
form the wonderful advance made by Peru during the 
last decade, and the further progress for which she is so 
evidently planning. 

No event in the recent history of Peru has made such 
a deep impression or been attended with such happy 
results as this visit of Mr. Eoot. He was received with a 



90 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

generous and spontaneous cordiality which perhaps has 
never been accorded to any other foreigner. From his 
first minute on Peruvian soil, to his last, his stay was one 
continuous ovation. The officials and the people vied 
with each other to do him honour. A hundred thousand 
dollars, it is said, were spent in Callao and Lima in dec- 
orations and banquets in his honour, and the people did 
not begrudge the outlay. 

Through it all, Mr. Eoot bore himself with admirable 
modesty, tact and geniality, and endeared himself and 
the American nation to this as well as the other republics 
which he visited. In every one of his numerous speeches 
which have been published in a volume, together with 
the addresses of the Peruvians, he spoke with freshness 
and vigour, and, while always cordial, never "slopped 
over." 

The same cannot be said perhaps for all the addresses 
which Mr. Eoot received from enthusiastic Peruvians. 
Said one distinguished statesman, whose address is pub- 
lished in this volume : ' 

"I consider your visit to those youthful republics, as 
one of the acts of most transcendency and of most histor- 
ical resonance that have been realized on this continent. 
When nations have attained to the power and develop- 
ment which to-day the United States exhibits ; when the 
citizens and the public power keep within that impassa- 
ble limit laid down by the legitimate desire of Liberty 
and Justice and by the imprescriptible (?) necessities of 
Order and Progress ; when all this is obtained in the 
midst of social well-being, of the commercial strength 
and of political predominance which overpasses the 
limits of the national soil ; then the legitimate and noble 
influence which is exercised in the life of other nations is 
founded not upon the narrow combinations of national 
egotism, but on the expansion and humane virtue of civ- 



PEEU EEDIVIYUS 91 

ilization. And your government has comprehended this, 
on giving you ample representation to these republics in 
harmony with the American ideal of union and progress, 
which the illustrious statesman, who, to the admiration 
and respect of all, presides to-day over the glorious 
destiny of the American nation, propagates and carries 
out in his words as a thinker and in his acts as a man- 
datory !" 

Let us hope that the words of this statesman suffered in 
their translation from Spanish to English, where they 
evidently gained in hifalutin spreadeagleism what they 
lost in sense. Most of the Peruvian addresses, however, 
were models of good sense as well as of brotherly cor- 
diality. 

The United States is evidently in high favour in Peru, 
for American capital and American men are helping to 
make the newer and better Peru in no small meas- 
ure. 

But the United States and Peru are old friends and 
allies. Peru has never forgotten how, in 1852, when 
some Americans claimed the Lobos guano islands off her 
coasts, and the United States was about to enforce these 
claims with her gunboats, she paused long enough to look 
into the matter. This convinced our country that Peru 
was in the right, and our countrymen in the wrong ; 
whereupon she recognized the absolute sovereignty of 
Peru over these islands. This act of justice was referred 
to more than once during the Eoot meetings, and in his 
reply to one minister of state Mr. Eoot said : 

*'Tou were kind enough to refer to an incident in the 
diplomatic history of the United States and Peru, when 
my own country recognized its error in regard to the 
Lobos Islands and returned them freely and cheerfully to 
their rightful owner. I would rather have the record of 
that act of justice for my country's fair name than the 



92 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

story of any battle fought and won by her military 
horoes." 

Surely it is worth while for a nation as for an indi- 
vidual to deal justly and to love mercy. After more 
than fifty years, the bread that we cast upon the diplo- 
matic waters in the Lobos incident, has returned to us, 
and has cemented the friendship of one of the finest and 
most progressive republics of South America. 

Our "Mandatory," President Eoosevelt, like his coun- 
try, is immensely popular in Peru. When I mentioned 
his name to one of the high officials, he threw out his 
chest, and drew in his breath, and exclaimed, " He is the 
greatest man in all the Americas. One of the greatest 
America ever produced." 

Over and over again such sentiments as the following, 
by a distinguished Peruvian, have been reechoed of late : 

"The purpose of our powerful Sister of the North is a 
noble one, that of a j)ersevering and ever steadfast en- 
deavour to combine continental interests lacking a suffi- 
cient cohesion, and promote their common development, 
thus managing to completely replace the dictates of force 
and war among nations, by those of peace and justice." 

Lima, all things considered, is a beautiful city. Built 
largely of adobe bricks and bamboo laths covered with 
mud, that a long, drenching rain (which fortunately 
never comes) would dissolve in a week, it yet presents 
the appearance of a substantial, permanent metropolis, 
as indeed it is. A good American tramway system sup- 
plies Lima's needs, and connects her with her port, 
Callao, in twenty minutes. Good water, good light and 
good sewerage make a safe and healthy city, while her 
beautiful plazas, fine public buildings, and streets which 
are beginning to be well-paved, make the capital of Peru 
one of the most attractive cities that lie beneath the 
Southern Cross. 



PEEU EEDIVIVUS 93 

In the great and beautiful cathedral of Lima lie the 
bones of that brilliant but dastardly adventurer and con- 
queror, Francisco Pizarro. As I looked at his shrunken 
limbs and his grinning skull, I could almost forgive his 
cruelty and his treachery, for his part in discovering 
to the old world this magnificent country of the new 
world, and for rescuing from Inca tyranny and absolu- 
tism this fair republic of Peru, which has had such a 
checkered past, but will have, I believe, such a glorious 
fature. 



XI 

LIMA, THE PARIS OF THE SOUTH 

The City oa the Rimao and the City on the Seine — History, Climate, 
Scenery — Lottery Tickets on the Tram Cars — Butter Making on 
Horseback— Ice Cream Venders— The Delicious Fruits of Peru — The 
Great Cathedral — The National Library — Relics of the Inca Regime 
— From the Library to the Prison — Lima's Place Among the World's 
Capitals. 

NOT without reason has Lima, the capital of 
Peru, been called the Paris of South America. 
Brightness, gayety, fine costumes, stylish 
women and gallant men, extensive shops displaying rich 
goods from all parts of the world, popular caf6s, historic 
churches, — all these characteristics of Paris the Great you 
find on a smaller scale in this Paris of the Andes. 

The Paris on the Eimac, too, is a historic city as well as 
the Paris on the Seine. It has been besieged and sacked. 
It has seen revolution and counter-revolution ; it has 
conquered and been conquered ; and it has come out of 
every tribulation still vigorous and often stronger, richer, 
and more prosperous than ever. 

Of course the comparison must not be pushed too far, 
for there are plenty of contrasts, if we look for them, as 
well as resemblances between the Paris that lies north of 
the equator and the smaller edition that lies south. 

In the matter of climate I should prefer the Peruvian 
Paris. It is never very hot and never cold. The Hum- 
boldt current in the Pacific tempers and cools the air, and 
even in midsummer (January and February in Peru) the 
weather is not oppressive, while sunstrokes are unknown. 

In grandeur of scenery and natural surroundings the 
South American capital is incomparably superior. The 

94 



LIMA, THE PAEIS OF THE SOUTH 95 

rushing Eimac, though smaller, is a far more beautiful 
river than the Seine ; and the majestic Andes stand 
guard round about Lima as few cities in the world are 
sentinelled. 

But enough of comparisons. There are plenty of 
matters of present interest to fascinate us. 

Callao (pronounced Oalyao), the port of Lima, is seven 
miles distant, and is connected with the capitalby oneof the 
best electric roads in the world. This road is of Ameri- 
can (United States) construction throughout, the equip- 
ment coming from Philadelphia ; and the express-cars go 
whizzing along past the Inca ruins five centuries old, and 
past modern gardens and villas, at the rate of thirty miles 
an hour. 

On reaching Lima one is apt to think that buying and 
selling lottery-tickets is the chief business of the in- 
habitants. At every street-corner these tickets are thrust 
into your face. Old men and women, boys and girls, 
cripples, blind men, and waifs and strays of all sorts, 
importune you to buy their yellow slips, with the fas- 
cinating numbers that may yield a fortune, but in all 
probability (a thousand chances to one, at least) will 
yield only experience and no cash. 

The state authorizes the lottery ; the Catholic Church 
even sanctions it and profits by it 5 and the grand draw- 
ings are great and, it would seem to the northerner, 
demoralizing events in Lima. Even some of the electric- 
car companies issue lottery -tickets instead of checks as a 
prevention of fraud on the part of the conductors. The 
people will demand these tickets on the chance of draw- 
ing a prize in the tramway company's lottery, and so 
these will serve as a check on the number of fares re- 
ceived. 

My friends accused me, jocosely, of buying a lottery- 
ticket during my very first hour in Lima ; and, sure 



96 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

enough, I did ; for on paying a car-fare of two and a half 
cents I was presented with a slip of paper that informed 
me in Spanish that it was a lottery-ticket, and must be 
preserved entire. 

A thousand things odd and interesting to unaccustomed 
eyes greet one at every turn in Lima — the milk-women 
sitting astride their horses, with big cans on either side, 
from which they deal out the lacteal fluid. One would 
think, as they go jogging along over the rough pavements, 
that their cream would soon become butter, and that 
there would be no need of a churn. Indeed, I have heard 
it said that, when a customer demands butter instead of 
milk, if it has not quite "come," the milk- woman will 
reply, ''I will take another turn around the square, and 
then the butter will be ready." However, I will not 
vouch for this ajleged Peruvian method of butter- 
making. 

The bakers mounted on their steeds with great panniers 
of bread on either side are equally picturesque, and so 
are the ice cream men carrying a freezer with its cooling 
contents on their heads. Ice is a prime luxury anywhere 
within twenty degrees of the equator, and one often sees 
ice-dealers at the street stalls shaving a block of ice with 
an instrument that looks like a carpenter's plane. When 
shaved, this snowlike product is packed into a glass, and 
then drenched with syrup to the taste of the customer, 
usually a small boy or girl, to whom this cooling confec- 
tion is a great delicacy. 

The fruit-stands of Lima in February are tempting in 
the extreme. Delicious grapes of every colour, ripe figs, 
oranges and bananas of course, peaches with their rosy 
cheeks, pomegranates cracked open so as to show their 
ruby seeds, and many varieties of fruit one never sees in 
a northern market. The pawpaws are excellent and 
wholesome j the custard-apples, in spite of their rough 



LIMA, THE PAEIS OF THE SOUTH 97 

and spiny exterior, are sweet and delicious ; the grena- 
dilla, or passion-flower fruit, has a delicate flavour of its 
own, while perhaps the most delicious fruit of all is the 
avocado pear, which is not a pear at all, but more like a 
melon with a hard, round seed at the core. It is eaten 
with vinegar, salt, and pepper, and for a breakfast fruit 
is not easily surpassed. 

But we must not linger at every strange and interesting 
spot, or we shall not get far into this Paris of the E^ew 
World. As we approach the central plaza, we find stores 
that would do credit to New York or London, large dry 
goods establishments, extensive jewelry stores, book and 
music and photograph shops of no small pretensions. 

The Cathedral plaza is really the centre of Lima, more 
than any other one spot. On one side is the truly im- 
posing Cathedral with its twin towers and its vast fayade ; 
at the right is the enormous palace, occupying a whole 
square, and containing not only the President's apart- 
ments, but the of&ces of other government departments as 
well. 

Fine stores, fronted by arcades, like the rue de Eivoli 
in Paris, or the shops of Berne and Bologna, occupy the 
other two sides of the plaza, which is fall of gay flowers, 
palms, and tropical trees, and is brightly lighted with 
strings of electric lamps at night. Altogether it is a 
most attractive centre, and from it radiate busy streets in 
every direction. 

The Cathedral is well worth a visit. It is imposing 
from its size and from the great height and width of its 
central aisle and naves. The recent decorations are in 
good taste and not over-gaudy, and a Protestant finds less 
in the nature of image- worship and Mariolatry to offend 
him here than in most Catholic churches. 

The national library is another interesting spot to visit. 
It contains about fifty thousand volumes, many of them 



98 THE CONTINENT OP OPPOETUNITY 

most valuable storehouses of South American lore. In 
the Chilean war of 1879 the library lost many of its 
most valuable treasures, the Chileans looting it in a 
shameless fashion, and even tearing up and throwing out 
of the windows precious manuscripts whose priceless 
value they could not appreciate. 

The chief librarian, the learned Dr. Eichard Palma, 
whose works are known far beyond Peru, kindly showed 
us over the library. A long row of books in uni- 
form bindings, comprising several hundred volumes, he 
pointed out with especial interest as a gift from the 
Smithsonian Institution of "Washington, ''The most valu- 
able gift the library has ever had," he assured us. 

The Peruvian Geographical Society has rooms in the 
same building, one of which is devoted to rare pottery 
and relics of Inca and pre-Inca times. 

Three or four civilizations undoubtedly antedated the 
Inca regime, and I was especially interested in one beauti- 
ful bowl, which was probably five hundred years older 
than Atahuallpa, the Inca emperor whom Pizarro found 
upon the throne and whom he so treacherously killed. 
The most curious thing about this bowl is that it has 
as its chief ornamental design the Chinese character for 
''heaven," showing conclusively, together with other 
proofs, so the archaeologists think, that Peru in prehis- 
toric times had communications with the Celestial Empire, 
and derived therefrom, in part at least, its earliest 
civilization. 

A curious clay musical instrument in this museum is 
supposed to be at least a thousand years old. It has 
eleven notes, but on a scale different from any known in 
modern music. 

From the still cloister of a library to the dark cells of 
a prison is a sharp transition, but alas ! in our modern 
civilization the latter is as necessary as the former. The 



LIMA, THE PAEIS OF THE SOUTH 99 

courteous governor of the prison showed us every part of 
his sorrowful domain, and I must say I have never seen 
a cleaner or better-ordered penitentiary. Over every 
door were the words, ''Silencia, Obediencia, Teabajo 
(work) " and the prisoners, most of whom were Indians 
or half-breeds, seemed to exemplify the mottoes in their 
workshops and at the breakfast table, when we saw them 
at their morning meal. 

All in all, Lima deserves its place among the world's 
capitals. It has had a great and stirring history. It is 
inhabited by a progressive, energetic, patriotic people. 
It has an almost unrivalled situation as the central metrop- 
olis of the Andes. Its future I believe will be greater 
and better than its past. 



XII 

AN ADVENTURE IN THE HIGH ANDES 

The Start from Lima — The Chalaca — The Highest Railway Pasa iu the 
World — A Modern Wonder — The Road Through the Desert — Deli- 
cious Fruit— Switch Backs— The Bridge of the Little Hell— The Ter- 
races of the Ancient Incas — The Llamas and Their Load — A Land- 
slide and Its Consequences. 

WE were in the vicinity of Lima long enough to 
take the most wonderful railway journey in 
the world, on the Peruvian Central Eailway ; 
a journey which included an adventure that came near 
preventing me from writing this or any later chapter 
of ''The Continent of Opportunity." 

But, to begin at the beginning and "not to antici- 
pate," as the story- writers say, we started from Lima 
one bright February morning (every February morning 
and every other morning in Lima is "brite and fare," 
for the city sees no rain from one year's end to the other) 
in a special excursion train chartered by our fellow pas- 
sengers on the steamer, as there was no regular train that 
would get back in time for the sailing of our boat. 

This excursion-car, which is kept for just such pur- 
poses, is a curious bob-tailed affair, called the Chalaca 
(or Callao). It looks as if about one-third of an ordinary 
passenger-car had been sliced off and closed up at the 
sliced end. It would comfortably hold perhaps fifteen 
people. 

The engine was equally diminutive, and was meant 
only to pull this little car ,• but it was a sturdy little loco- 
motive built in Wilmington, Del., and went puffing up 

100 



AN ADVENTUEE IN THE HIGH ANDES 101 

the steep grades of the Andes at a great rate, as if it 
meant to reach the summit or perish in the attempt. 

At once after leaving the station at Lima the road be- 
gins to climb and never stops climbing until it reaches a 
point on Mt. Meiggs, theGalera tunnel, 15,500 feet above 
the sea. This enormous height, overtopping Mt. Blanc, 
is the highest railway pass in the world. 

The whole railway is a wonderful monument to Amer- 
ican pluck and engineering skill, for it was built by Mr. 
Meiggs, the eminent financier and promoter who came 
to grief in California and largely reinstated himself in 
public opinion before his death in South America. 
When we remember that it was constructed thirty years 
ago, before the building of mountain railways was under- 
stood as it is to-day, the wonder of this stupendous rail- 
way grows upon us. 

Says Mr. Newhouse, a well-known English writer : 
'/This admirable work puts Peru in the first place 
among all the countries of Latin America, as no other 
can pride itself on possessing such a colossal work as the 
Oroya Eailroad, which, together with the Suez Canal, the 
Thames, Mersey, and St. Gothard tunnels, and the 
Brooklyn Bridge, hold the supremacy of the wonderful 
civil constructions of our times. It is simply astounding 
that a South American republic just emerging into life, 
exposed to all the ups and downs of its political destiny, 
should have undertaken and carried out this gigantic 
work which might rouse the envy of many nations of the 
Old and New World." 

Such encomiums do not seem exaggerated as one 
mounts the heights of the Andes on the wings of this 
wonderful railway. In fact, the dictionary does not con- 
tain adjectives enough to over-express the sublimity and 
grandeur of this journey. 

For the first forty miles out of Lima the country, ex- 



102 THE CONTINENT OP OPPOETUNITY 

cept where irrigated, is an absolute desert. No rain has 
fallen here to any appreciable extent within the memory 
of man. Gaunt, forbidding, verdureless mountains 
stretch up to heaven. To the right, to the left, be- 
fore, behind, everywhere, these awful, frowning moun- 
tains ! 

To be sure, the road follows the bed of the rushing 
Eimac Eiver, which supplies Lima with electric power 
and with delicious water ; but the stream, beautiful as it 
is in its foaming, white, billowy course, seems to make but 
little impression upon the soil along its banks ; and the 
desert, except for a few bushes or a thin strip of green, 
seems to come down to the water's edge, as much as to 
say, " This is my domain ; I am supreme here." 

In some few places the water has been drawn off from 
the river to irrigate the surrounding fields ; and, where 
this has been done, everything smiles as if it were the 
garden of the Lord, for the soil is wonderfully productive 
wherever water can reach it. Great fields of Indian corn 
and sugar-cane wave in the breeze at such places ; tall 
palms and banana trees spring up as if by magic by 
every irrigating canal ; and all plant life flourishes. 

Peaches, pears, and apples, delicious avocado pears, 
watermelons, strawberries, custard apples, oranges, and 
half a dozen other varieties of fruit one never sees out of 
the tropics grow in these sheltered, irrigated fields on the 
foot-hills of the Andes. Picturesque Indians offer the 
fruit for sale at the railway stations. Some of them are 
Peruvian Indians, degenerate sons of noble Inca sires ; 
others are from the Bolivian plateau, and are known by 
their peculiar ponchos, which in reality are nothing but 
bright-coloured blankets with a hole cut through the 
middle, through which the Indian thrusts his head. 

Up, up, up, up, the wonderful railway rises, one thou- 
sand, two thousand, five thousand, ten thousand, fifteen 



AN ADVENTUEE IN THE HIGH ANDES 103 

thousand feet above the sea ; and with every turn and 
zigzag the scenery becomes more awfully grand. 

There is no rack-and-pinion system on this road, as in 
Switzerland, where the mountain railways could almost 
climb straight up the side of a church ; but the ascent in 
the Andes is made by switch- backs, the road running as 
far as it can in one direction, and then turning and run- 
ning in the opposite direction to compass another eleva- 
tion. 

There are many tunnels and "bridges over frightful 
chasms. One of these, the Verrugas bridge, is the 
highest in the world ; and it seems, on looking down 
from the parapet, as if you were gazing into the very 
bowels of the earth. Another is called the "Puente del 
Infernillo," or the "Bridge of the Little Hell." So 
dreadful were the surroundings, and so dizzy the depth, 
that one might be excused for leaving off the qualifying 
adjective in naming it. 

However high we reached, we did not get out of the 
region of Alpine flowers. Great bushes of heliotrope 
lined the banks wherever there was any moisture, until 
we had reached a height of ten thousand feet at least, but 
they were a scentless heliotrope, like most other Andean 
flowers. 

Nor did we lose sight of the Inca civilization in all this 
journey. The remains of the splendid roads they cut out 
of the mountainside, are still there. The terraces on the 
side of the steepest hills, sometimes forty or fifty of them 
one above another, were simply stupendous monuments 
of their patience and skill, and are still plainly visible. 

Think of starting with bare, wind-swept, sun-baked 
rocks thousands of feet high, as the Andes are in this part 
of the chain, and making a garden of them for more than 
a thousand feet up their precipitous sides ! That is what 
the Incas did on the sides of these tremendous precipices. 



104 THE COKTINEKT OF OPPOETUNITY 

Of course all the soil had to be hoisted up to these eyries 
on the backs of men, for there is no natural soil there. 
But there they had their gardens, and raised their maize 
and their fruits and their flowers. Nothing has given 
me a more vivid sense of the power and advanced civ- 
ilization of this wonderful race than these mountain 
terraces. 

The animals of the Andes are also most interesting. 
Way up on a mountainside two thousand feet above us 
we could often descry a flock of goats or some white mov- 
ing patches about as big as flies, which afterwards re- 
solved themselves into sheep. Hardy little donkeys would 
trudge along nonchalantly, but really with the utmost 
care, on the edge of an awful precipice, where a misstep 
would mean instant death two thousand feet below. 

But the most interesting and characteristic animals are 
the llamas. These hardy little beasts are daintily built 
and intelligent, and are largely used as burden-bearers in 
the high Andes. They have long, graceful necks, liquid 
brown eyes, and shaggy wool on their backs, which, how- 
ever, is too coarse to be of much value commercially. 
But as beasts of burden they are most valuable, carrying 
each a load of a hundred pounds and refusing to carry 
any more, even when it is put upon them. But with this 
load they will trudge along twelve or fifteen miles a day, 
for weeks at a time, asking for no water and but for little 
food ; and that little they pick up for themselves on the 
way. 

After journeying about forty miles the mountains 
showed symptoms of greenness ; grass and shrubs and 
flowers became more numerous, for we were getting 
beyond the rainless belt into the section that enjoys a 
rainy season. To our sorrow we soon found that we were 
journeying in the rainy season, as the sequel of our story 
proves. 



AN ADVENTURE IN THE HIGH ANDES 105 

For six hours we steadily climbed by curves and 
switch-backs this tremendous chain of mountains. At 
last our time was exhausted, and reluctantly we had to 
turn back, after reaching a height of some 12,500 feet, 
not the highest point on the road by any means, but one 
that afforded one of the grandest views. 

By this time it had begun to rain heavily. For an 
hour we descended merrily, running about twenty miles 
an hour, when suddenly, upon turning a sharp curve, 
there directly in our path was a landslide which had 
brought down tons of mud and soil and rocks upon the 
track. It was too late to avoid it. The engineer reversed 
his engine, but plump went the little locomotive into the 
soft debris, almost burying itself in it. Fortunately for 
us the mass was very soft, and neither car nor engine left 
the track ; otherwise we should have rolled over a fright- 
ful precipice hundreds of feet into the valley beneath, 
for we were nearly nine thousand feet above the sea when 
the accident occurred. 

Our engine shrieked for help, with all its steam lungs, 
and soon a gang of workmen came to dig it out ; but, as 
it threatened to be an all-night's job, we walked on some 
five miles to the next station, through the drenching 
rain. Within a quarter of a mile we passed four other 
landslides, one much larger than the one which stalled 
our engine. 

Every moment there was danger of further landslips 
and boulders coming down upon our heads, for a heavy 
shower always loosens the soil, and makes travelling dan- 
gerous at this time of the year. But we reached the next 
station in safety, and there spent the night in a little 
village inn. 

By six o'clock the next morning our engine had been 
dug out of its muddy bed. It proved to be uninjured, 
and we went on our way rejoicing, down the great moun- 



106 THE COKTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

tain's flanks, with a new realization of the beauty and 
truth of the words of the travellers' Psalm, ' ' The Lord 
shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this 
time forth, and even for evermore." 



XIII 

WHERE THE STARS SIT FOR THEIR PORTRAITS 

A Jewel Worthy of Its Setting— How We Reach Arequipa — Travelling 
Sand Hills— A Wonderful Transformation Scene — ^A Garden of Eden 
in Bloom — Misti and Chachani — Hotel Horse Car — Big Busy and 
Bigoted Arequipa — The Great Cathedral— The Walk to the Observa- 
tory — The Great Telescopes — What the Camera Reveals. 

THERE are many observatories in the world, but 
none, I venture to say, quite like the one on the 
Andes in the heart of Peru, in the old and proud 
city of Arequipa. 

It is a jewel worthy of its setting, and all the more in- 
teresting in my eyes because it is an American observa- 
tory, manned by American astronomers, built and 
equipped by American money, a branch of Harvard 
University, separated from its parent institution by 
almost the diameter of the world. 

It is a far cry from Cambridge, Mass., to Arequipa, 
Peru, and a weary journey. With the best luck in mak- 
ing connections it cannot often be accomplished in less 
than a month. After sailing to Panama in seven days, 
and crossing the Isthmus, one must crawl down the west 
side of South America as already described in the slow- 
est kind of a coasting-steamer, which makes an average 
of about a hundred miles a day, stopping at all sorts 
of insignificant and unheard-of ports. 

At last MoUendo, a surf-lashed landing-place on the 
utterly unprotected shore of Peru, is reached. If we 
have good fortune, we may be able to get ashore the same 
day, or we may have to be carried by to the next port, 
and wait for a week before we can get back, as in rough 

107 



108 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

weather no one can embark or disembark at Mollendo 
for days at a time. 

Neptune favoured us, for it was reasonably calm when 
we landed, and after a tremendous tossing and bouncing 
on the mountainous swell which always rolls in on that 
coast, our sturdy Indian boatman guided our little craft 
in between the threatening rocks that bar the entrance to 
the landing- stairs, and we found ourselves in one of the 
driest, dustiest, most forbidding little towns on the planet. 

But everybody is so glad to get ashore at Mollendo that 
he does not mind dust or dirt, and rather rejoices in any- 
thing that savours of terra firma. 

The train was waiting, and we wasted no time in Mol- 
lendo, but boarded an American car drawn by an Amer- 
ican engine that was to take us over mountains three 
miles high and land us at last on the shores of Lake 
Titicaca. But long before scaling the loftiest of these 
dizzy heights we should reach Arequipa, which is less 
than half-way up the flanks of the Andes. 

For hours our sturdy engine puffed and panted to sur- 
mount the foot-hills and outer ramparts of the coast range 
of the Andes, ever rising higher and revealing new scenes 
of desolate grandeur. Eocky peaks, precipices frightful, 
abysmal gullies, a constant succession of them as far as 
the eye could see and as much farther as the imagination 
could reach. At one place where we crossed a plateau a 
few miles wide we saw hundreds of the famous travelling 
sand-hills which submerge railway stations and every- 
thing else in their irresistible progress, and which often 
keep an army of men shovelling out the rails and rolling- 
stock. 

Then more mountains, and more and more, our road 
ever crawling up, up, up, but never showing us a blade 
of grass, or a tree, or a green thing on all the vast 
mountainsides. 



WHERE THE STAES SIT 109 

At last, after about six hours of climbing, we reach a 
height of nearly eight thousand feet, and suddenly a 
wonderful transformation-scene greets our eyes. Just 
below us is a valley of marvellous fertility, — the valley 
of the Chili Eiver. Great fields of the greenest alfalfa 
line its banks and acres of the heaviest Indian corn I ever 
saw wave their ^tasselled plumes in the air ; for it is the 
end of summer in Peru about the middle of March. 
Sugar-cane, banana-trees, palms, peach-trees, pome- 
granates, figs, and various rare and curious fruit-trees 
we never saw before, greet our eyes. 

At each little station swarms of swarthy Peruvians, 
whose natural complexion was enhanced by several layers 
of soil, beseech us to buy great baskets holding at least a 
peck of delicious green grapes for twenty cents in their 
money (ten tents in gold), or as many purple figs for the 
same price. 

The transition from the savage, uncompromising desert 
to this blooming Garden of Eden is so sudden that we can 
hardly believe our eyes. It is as if a panorama had been 
unrolled suddenly, and we are half inclined to think that 
the valley of the Chili is only painted upon canvas. 

But as this thought crosses our minds, the impos- 
ing city of Arequipa, with its cathedral towers, and 
many churches and plazas and public buildings comes in 
view ; and we realize that we are in one of the most 
fertile and famous valleys in all Peru. 

The picturesqueness and grandeur of the scene are in- 
creased tenfold by two great mountains, Misti and Cha- 
chani, which stretch up nearly twenty thousand feet 
towards the sun, and form a magnificent background to 
the city only a few miles away. Misti is regular, sym- 
metrical, cone-shaped, a South American Fujiyama, only 
much higher than the beautiful mountain shrine of the 
Japanese. Chachani, though nearly as high, is ragged 



110 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

and rugged, and rises in several jagged saw-teeth to the 
heavens, a mountain even more imposing than smooth 
and regular Misti. Both are covered with snow from an 
elevation of 16,000 feet to the top, and every morning we 
see donkeys, laden with snow and ice from this natural 
refrigerator, bringing down their cold product for the ice 
cream shops of Arequipa. 

At the railway station we are met not by a hack or 
bus of any kind, but by a special hotel horse-car which 
takes us to the " Gran Central," a hotel whose grandilo- 
quent name tries to make up for other deficiencies. 

Arequipa is one of the biggest, busiest, and most 
bigoted cities in Peru. Next to Lima, it is, perhaps, of 
the most importance. It is the stronghold of the oldest 
and most conservative families. Priestcraft flourishes ; 
the women especially are peculiarly fanatical ; and until 
recently Protestantism has had no foothold at all within 
its borders. Even now the worshippers in the little back 
upper room which serves as a Protestant chapel are often 
stoned, as they were one evening when I attended it ; and 
landlords, frightened by the priests, often compel the 
mission and the missionaries to move from place to place. 

But Mr. and Mrs. Jarrett and their assistants, Mr. 
Eitchie and Mr. Job of the "Eegions Beyond" mission, 
are bravely holding this difl&cult fort on the very frontier 
of Protestantism. The meetings are well attended ; a 
few converts have rewarded thefr efforts ; and a foothold 
has been gained for the Eeformed faith, which the machi- 
nations of the dominant church, and the frequent false- 
hoods of the newspapers about Protestantism, and the 
constant attack on the Protestant missionaries, will not be 
able to uproot. 

The cathedral at Arequipa is an imposing building 
occupying a whole side of a large plaza, which, for some 
unaccountable re^on, has just been destroyed by the 



WHEEE THE STAES SIT 111 

authorities, the trees and plants ruthlessly torn up, and 
the whole beautiful square made a howling wilderness. 

But for most Americans Arequipa is strictly the jewel- 
case which, as I have said, holds the jewel of the Harvard 
Observatory ; and like most of our countrymen we soon 
made our way out to this famous spot two miles from the 
centre of the city. 

The walk to the observatory is a fine preparation for 
what we find at our journey's end. It leads through the 
oldest, dirtiest, slummiest part of Arequipa. The narrow, 
cobble-paved streets are reeking with filth and thick with 
dust. Every other open door you pass in the long lines 
of mud and adobe houses (and they are aU open, reveal- 
ing all the occupations and privacies of the families) is a 
low shop for eating and drinking, where frowzy women 
and pockmarked, low-browed men are eating themselves 
full, and drinking themselves drunk with cheap alcohol. 
Over many of the shops are curious tin signs, with all 
sorts of mermaids, sea-nymphs, ' and land hobgoblins 
painted on them. 

Through nearly a mile of such streets we pass, and then 
emerge into the comparatively open country. A little 
farther, and we mount a steep rise of ground, which in 
this rarified air makes us pant ; and find ourselves out of 
the purgatory of Arequipa' s slums and in the paradise 
of a fresh, clean, sweet, flower-decked American home. 
Mrs. Frost, the wife of the director, welcomes us most 
hospitably to her comfortable home and spacious pi- 
azza, which commands one of the finest views in Peru, 
and indeed, in all the world. Around the house is a 
large garden of beautiful flowers. Here are geraniums 
and heliotropes growing as large as barberry bushes with 
us, exquisite roses, a great peach-tree loaded with blush- 
ing fruit, fine l^orfolk Island pines, and all sorts of trop- 
ical and temperate fruits and flowers. 



112 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

In the foreground lies the luxuriant valley of the Chili, 
and, just beyond, the city of Arequipa, which looks 
clean and fresh through the merciful spy-glass of dis- 
tance. Off to the west, but yet so near that every ridge 
and outline is defined in the marvellous atmosphere, are 
beautiful Misti and lordly Chachani, each towering more 
than two miles above us, while the rushing Chili Eiver 
cuts a deep gorge at the foot of the observatory hill. 
What view in all the world combines such mountains and 
such a valley with roaring river and busy city to give 
life to the superb scene ? 

The observatory is built for the sole purpose of pho- 
tographing the heavens, and this spot was chosen, after 
careful study of many other parts of the world, as the very 
best accessible place for the purpose, by reason of the 
rarity and exceeding clarity of the air in the dry season. 

Two telescopes are here mounted, one of which is the 
largest of its kind in the world. Though it weighs two 
tons, it is so nicely balanced and adjusted that it can al- 
most be moved with the little finger. Mr. Frost, the di- 
rector (and, by the way, his assistant is Mr. Snow), kindly 
explained the working of the tremendous camera, which 
cost $50,000, and has probably added more to the perma- 
nent record of the heavens than any other instrument. 

Every clear night when the moon is not too bright the 
great lens is pointed to some spot in the heavens ; and the 
stars are made to give up the age-long secret of their 
numbers, their distance, and their composition. Mr. 
Frost showed us a single negative, seventeen by fourteen 
inches in size on which he had caught the pictures of — 
how many stars should you guess? A hundred, five 
hundred, five thousand? No less than four hundred 
thousand ! And it would take two thousand plates of 
this size to photograph the whole heavens as seen from 
the Arequipa observatory. 



WHEEB THE STAES SIT 113 

To be sure, not all these plates would contain so many 
stars as this famous one ; but, making all allowances, 
how many millions upon millions of worlds does this 
giant camera reveal, many of these worlds so remote that 
the eye could not detect them when aided by the most 
powerful telescope ! But the photographic plate is far 
more sensitive than the human eye. 

There is a luminous spot in the heavens that looks like 
a single star to the naked eye. "When the Arequipa lens 
is turned upon it, and its photograph is taken, it resolves 
itself into eight thousand different stars, some of them so 
remote that their light has taken hundreds of years to 
reach us. In comparison with their distance a journey 
to our moon would be as a walk across the street when 
compared to a journey from Cambridge to Arequipa. 

Such marvels is this great telescope constantly bring- 
ing to light, and peopling our universe with hitherto un- 
seen worlds. 

I know of no place so good for a conceited man to visit 
as the Arequipa observatory. First, Misti and Chachani 
must dwarf him in his own eyes, if he has any sense of 
proportion ; and then, as he goes into the observatory, 
and sees the starry wonders reflected on the photographic 
plate, his mind is staggered at the vastness of the uni- 
verse ; and with a sense of his own insignificance it would 
seem that he must cry out : 

" When I consider the heavens, the work of Thy fingers, 
The moon and the stars, which Thou hast ordained, 
What is man, that Thoa art mindful of him ? 
And the son of man, that Thou visitest him ? " 

Like Coleridge, interpreting the voice of Mt. Blanc, 
one can only hear the stars at Arequipa say, "God! 
God ! God ! God ! " 



XIV 

BOLIVIA, THE COUNTRY OF THE GREAT PLATEAU 

Its Claims to Distinction — Its Twenty Lofty Mountains — Its Past Min- 
eral Wealtti — Its Blood-stained History — The Natives Under Spanish 
Rule — The Revolt of Tupac Amaru — Bolivia, the Battle-ground of 
the Great Revolution — Bolivar's Ambition — Years of Lawless Dicta- 
torship — The Happier Future. 

BOLIVIA has several claims to distinction among 
its -sister states of South America, and indeed 
among the nations of the world. No other coun- 
try except Thibet is so near the heavens physically, what- 
ever may be said of its spiritual and moral proximity. 
It occupies the southern part of the great central plateau 
of South America, and except where this plateau drops 
sharply towards the Atlantic, its people live in the rari- 
fied atmosphere of 12, 000 feet above the sea. 

Bolivia contains the largest number of lofty mountain 
peaks of any country except northern India, though the 
highest mountain of South America is not found within 
her borders, but in Chile. Yet, rising up from the 
enormous Bolivian plateau are fully twenty mountains 
that approximate 20,000 feet in height, and several that 
considerably exceed this enormous altitude. It is diffi- 
cult to obtain an idea of these Andean monsters until one 
sees them for himself lying along the horizon with their 
tremendous bulk and towering, here and there, in their 
white solitariness, far towards the zenith, dwarfing the 
highest Alps, as the Alps dwarf the white hills of New 
Hampshire or the (xi-een Mountains of Vermont. 

In its mineral wealth, too, Bolivia is one of the leaders 

114 



BOLIVIA 115 

of the nations. When we remember that in its isolation, 
cut off from the sea by four hundred miles of almost im- 
passable mountain wilds, it yet ranks third among the 
silver producing countries of the world, and almost as 
high in its production of tin and copper, we see that the 
Bolivia of the Great Plateau, in spite of its remoteness 
and its sparse and igndrant population, is a country to be 
reckoned with. 

It must be remembered, too, that Bolivia, of all South 
American countries, has been most distracted by civil 
wars, tyrannized over by dictators, and made the constant 
football of her stronger neighbours ; that she has enjoyed 
only about a decade of comparatively stable national life, 
and that she emerged from a perfect chaos of misrule and 
anarchical plunder only a score of years ago. Under 
these conditions, her present prosperity and future bright 
prospects seem all the more remarkable. 

Bolivia's recorded history, like that of the other Inca 
states, begins with Huascar and Atahuallpa, the contend- 
ing emperor brothers, who, at the time of the Spanish 
conquest, divided all Incadom between them. Huascar' s 
portion was the southern plateau of Peru, including lake 
Titicaca and the great table-lands to the south and east 
(now Bolivia) where his ancestors had originated, and 
where the greatest temples and palaces of his race had 
been built. In the disastrous war with his stronger 
brother, Atahuallpa, he had been worsted and captured, 
when at that moment Pizarro came upon the scene, con- 
quered and basely killed Atahuallpa, and for the sake of 
making some show of legitimacy for his conquest, sided 
with Huascar' s line, as the rightful emperor, and rode 
with him in triumph into Cuzco, the capital, welcomed 
by the peoples of Bolivia and Chile as their deliverer and 
ally. 

Then follow, in Bolivia's history as in that of Peru and 



116 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

Ecuador, the long centuries of Spanish misrule and op- 
pression, when nine-tenths of the population was killed 
off by forced labour in the mines, during most of which 
the docile and patient Indians, as submissive under the 
pretensions of the Spaniards as of their own Incas, went 
to the wall. The great difference was that under the 
ancient regime of their emperors they were protected, 
preserved, regulated to the last degree ; their birth, mar- 
riage, life and death provided for ; regarded as splendid 
draft animals to be carefully cared for ; — under the 
Spaniards they were worked to death in the shortest pos- 
sible space of time, regarded only as machines for the 
extraction of gold and silver from the mountains, ma- 
chines to be thrown upon the scrap heap as soon as they 
were worn out. 

'' To work the mines," we are told, ''the Spaniards 
ruthlessly impressed the helpless Indians. Each village 
was required to furnish a certain number of labourers an- 
nually. Lots were drawn as if for a proscription, and 
the unhappy creatures who drew the bad numbers went 
off to meet certain death in the dark wet pits and gal- 
leries, bidding good-bye to their wives and children like 
men stepping upon the scaffold. The destruction of life 
was frightful, the returns made by the officials charged 
with the impressment demonstrating that in the neigh- 
bourhood of Potosi, the Indian population fell within a 
hundred years to a tenth of its original numbers." ' 

Not that there were not laws, often complicated and 
carefully drawn, to protect the natives. But these laws, 
framed in the mother country, remained largely upon 
paper. The thirty corregidors or governors of the thirty 
different districts into which the country was divided, 
simply did as they pleased, each intent upon wringing 
the last dollar from the unhappy land. The Indians 
' Davrson's " South American Bepnblics." 



BOLIVIA 117 

were entirely at their mercy, and even the whites and 
half-breeds could do but little, if anything, to restrain 
the avarice and cruelty of the governors. 

There was but one determined effort to resist this 
infamous rapacity, and this was made in 1780 by Tupac 
Amaru, a direct descendant of the Inca emperors, whose 
blood was stirred, like that of Moses, by the insolent 
oppression of the taskmasters. Like Moses, too, he took 
the law into his own hands, and slew one of the worst of 
these taskmasters, a corregidor whose misrule was par- 
ticularly intolerable. Then he called upon the people to 
rise, and they flocked to his standard by the thousands. 

Tupac was able to equip some of them with firearms, 
and at first his troops were successful. Wherever he 
went he addressed the people from the church steps, call- 
ing upon them to rise and redress their wrongs ; but 
though he was hailed everywhere as the redeemer, he 
could not promote a general insurrection, so subservient 
had the Indians become to the Spaniards and so fearful 
of disobeying them. Vastly superior forces soon con- 
quered his small army, and " he himself was sentenced to 
be torn in pieces by horses after witnessing with his own 
eyes the fearful tortures and death of his innocent wife 
and children." 

But Tupac did not die in vain. The awful barbarity 
of the punishment inflicted upon himself and his com- 
rades aroused such indignation even in the breasts of the 
stolid Indians and half-breeds, and their threats became 
so ominous that the frightened home government abol- 
ished the office of corregidor and introduced many of the 
reforms for which Tupac fought. Even then the Spanish 
power was doomed, and the people only awaited the 
favourable moment for throwing off the yoke of three 
centuries. 

This time came to Bolivia, then called Upper Peru, aa 



118 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

to the other South American countries, when, in the 
early part of the nineteenth century, the troubles of the 
Bourbons at home occupied their attention and gave the 
oppressed people their opportunity. ''From 1809 to 
1825," we are told, ''with scarcely an intermission, 
battle succeeded battle, campaign campaign, and insur- 
rection insurrection, as the Spaniards and patriots, alter- 
nately victorious, marched and countermarched along 
the great mountain road that winds through the plateau 
from Humahuaca, on the Argentine frontier, to the bar- 
rier north of Lake Titicaca. Not a village but what was 
captured and pillaged, not merely once but many times, 
and the tale of garottings, of massacres, burnings and 
depredations, of heads and hands spiked up by hundreds 
along the highways, wearies in the telling." 

Bolivia was the battle ground of the contending armies 
more than any of the South American republics, being 
midway between the Argentine, Chile, on the one side, 
and Northern Peru and Ecuador on the other, and was 
the Virginia of the long rebellion which at last freed 
South America from Spanish domination. 

San Martin and Sucr6 are the two names that emerge 
from the welter of these awful years of bloodshed with 
distinction, because of their bravery and genuine patriot- 
ism. San Martin was an Argentine who fought unsel- 
fishly for South American freedom, and never yielded to 
Bolivar's sin, the desire for personal aggrandizement and 
power. To be sure, Bolivar was in at the finish when 
the Spaniards, worn out by the stubborn resistance of the 
colonists, were about ready to give in, and the grateful 
people hailed him as their saviour and named their 
country for him — Bolivia. 

But his ambition was soon plainly evident, — to carve 
out a number of small states with his faithful henchmen 
for governors, while he himself should be dictator of the 



BOLIVIA 119 

whole South American confederation. To this end he 
practically defined the limits of Bolivia or Upper Peru, 
which were substantially the boundaries of the Bolivia of 
to-day, though she was given a little strip of coast line, 
which, a few years ago, she lost in the disastrous war 
with Chile. Even yet her exact boundaries with Peru, 
Brazil and the Argentine are not exactly surveyed or 
definitely fixed, though, through bargain and conquest 
on one side or the other they are gradually approaching 
definiteness. 

On the 11th of August, 1825, the new Eepublic of 
Bolivia was proclaimed. In her Declaration of Inde- 
pendence we are assured that: ''Upper Peru (Bolivia) 
is the altar upon which the first blood was shed for 
liberty and where the last tyrant perished. The barbar- 
ous burning of more than a hundred villages, the destruc- 
tion of towns, the scaffolds raised everywhere for the 
partisans of liberty, the blood of thousands of victims 
that would make even Caribs shudder ; the taxes and 
exactions, as arbitrary as inhuman, the insecurity of 
property, life and honour itself ; an atrocious and merci- 
less inquisitorial system ; all have not been able to ex- 
tinguish the sacred fire of liberty and the just hatred of 
Spanish power." 

Though Bolivia had gained her independence, she had 
not learned to use it, and the next sixty years of her his- 
tory are years of miserable misrule, petty squabbles for 
power, violent and lawless dictatorships when some strong 
and unscrupulous man came to the front : — a history not 
worth studying or reciting. Occasionally an honest man, 
like Dr. Linares, made some effort to rid his countrymen 
from the rule of the official highwayman, but he made 
little impression upon its history. In three years during 
the rule of the bastard, Cordova, no less than nine revo- 
lutions were started and suppressed, and the average of a 



120 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

revolution or an attempted revolution a year marked 
Bolivia's history for nearly half a century. 

Things became so bad that Great Britain at last ceased 
all diplomatic relations with her, declaring that : *' Bo- 
livia could no longer be recognized as a civilized nation." 
To this day, Great Britain is accredited with no minister 
at La Paz, but only with a consular agent. 

The Chilean war of 1879, though in one respect a great 
calamity, was perhaps a blessing in disguise, for since it 
deprived Bolivia of her strip of seacoast, her only outlet 
to the world over her own soil, it threw her back upon 
her vast resources of mine and forest, which she is now 
cultivating more industriously than ever. 

Since the Chilean war there have been few internal 
disturbances. In 1899 occurred the last revolution, when 
General Pando overthrew President Alonzo in battle. 
Under Pando' s presidency the country enjoyed tranquil- 
lity and greater prosperity than ever, which has been 
continued and increased under the wise rule of President 
Montt, who is still in power. 

All the revolutions and counter revolutions, tyrannies 
and usurpations to which unhappy Bolivia has been 
subjected, have not destroyed her natural resources, and 
her recuperating power is great. Her mountains are still 
full of silver and gold, tin and copper. Her forests have 
inexhaustible supplies of rubber and precious woods, 
American and European capital is pouring into the 
country to make these riches available, and a happier 
day is dawning for the Eepublic of the Great Plateau. 



XV 

THE SWITZERLAND OF SOUTH AMERICA 

Bolivia Like and Unlike Switzerland— Landing at MoUendo— Up the 
Andes by Bail— A Bibbon of Green— The Beautiful Valley of Arequipa 
—The Travelling Sand Hills —14,666 Feet Above the Sea— Satiated with 
Mountains — The Marvels of Lake Titicaca— The " Coya " and the 
" Inca " — Titicaca Island — A Capital in a Crater. 

BOLIYIA like Switzerland, must be entered through 
foreign territory, for since the last war with Chile 
she has had no outlet to the sea over her own ter- 
ritory. But Bolivia shares with Switzerland the advan- 
tages of a mountainous country, difficult of access by 
enemies, and capable of rearing and sustaining a sturdy 
race of progressive, liberty-loving people. 

Infinitely behind Switzerland in education, stable civil 
government, refinement and cleanliness of the people, it 
is yet like Switzerland in present-day prosperity, while 
its resources are infinitely beyond Switzerland, if only 
they were developed. Bolivia is a Switzerland with 
loftier Alps, larger lakes, and far more extensive table- 
lands, a Switzerland with silver, copper and tin in un- 
limited quantities ; a Switzerland that can produce rub- 
ber, coca, and quinine as can no other land were these 
riches fully developed ; a Switzerland where every prod- 
uct of the temperate or tropical zone will flourish. 

Such a country is worth careful study for it is sure to 
take a leading place among the South American Ee- 
publics, unless conquered and annexed by some of her 
stronger neighbours. 

The approach to Bolivia is most unpromising. The 

121 



122 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

only two ports by which she reaches the sea to-day are 
Mollendo and Antofagasta ; the one in Peru, the other in 
Chile, and each vies with the other for the unhappy dis- 
tinction of being the worst port in the known world. 
They are both merely open roadsteads on the unindented 
western coast of South America, and the swell of the 
Pacific is so heavy that often, for days at a time, no pas- 
sengers can be landed or freight handled. "We landed at 
Mollendo in Peru. Even on a calm day the sweU seems 
frightful to a landsman, as he steps ofi" the ship's ladder, 
or is lowered in a bucket by a derrick from the ship's 
deck into a small boat. 

This is tossed about like a cockle shell, now we are 
thrown up to heaven on the crest of the wave, now 
dropped down towards the nadir in its hollow; the 
swarthy Peruvian oarsmen strain at the oars, they avoid 
the jagged rocks between the boat and the pier by a 
hair's breadth, and, at last, land us safely at the steps 
which are submerged more than half the time, and where 
we have to watch our chance to jump out of the boat 
when it rises to just the right height, neither too far 
above or too far below the slippery landing place. And 
this is the chief port of entrance and exit for a nation 
larger in area than Prance or Germany with Great Britain 
added to either one. 

The further approach to Bolivia is just as difficult as 
the entrance. A single track railway starts from Mol- 
lendo, and after running a dozen miles along the shore, it 
strikes boldly in among the mountains, and climbs and 
climbs and climbs 5,000, 10,000, almost 15,000 feet before 
it can find a pass by which the Andes can be crossed into 
the great republic of Bolivia, the third largest in all South 
America. At last, after climbing two gigantic ranges of 
mountains in the course of 300 miles, we come to Lake 
Titicaca. It would seem as though nature intended to 



' ^ 



THE SWITZERLAND OF SOUTH AMEEICA 123 

put every barrier of land and water between Bolivia and 
the outside world. 

To be sure, a great lake is not of itself a barrier, but a 
link between states and nations. But when we remember 
that every timber and steel plate and bolt and piece of 
machinery to construct the boats that sail this lake, must 
be brought from Europe or America, and toilsomely tran- 
sported over some of the highest mountains in the world, 
we see that a great lake, more than the length of Lake 
Erie, lying in the way of traffic, is at first a most seri- 
ous barrier. 

Let us take this journey from Mollendo on the sea into 
the heart of Bolivia. After being tossed ashore in a big 
row-boat, over the tremendous swells, we are glad to find 
that there is a train about to start up the mountains. 
There is nothing to detain us in the hot, dusty, stuffy 
Peruvian town of Mollendo, and we board the train that 
daily winds its way among the peaks of the Andes to 
Arequipa, a sort of half-way station to Bolivia, where all 
the trains tie up for the night. 

Our train consists of two passenger cars and a baggage 
car, built on the American plan. The second class car 
has no windows, but is all open at the sides, except for 
flopping curtains, that may be drawn down in case of 
rain or snow which are very common on the higher 
passes. The one first class coach looks as though it had 
done duty forty years ago on a second class American rail- 
road ; it is shabby and dirty, and, when it rains, it leaks 
at every pore, so that the passengers have to put up their 
umbrellas to keep from being soaked. The engines, 
however, seem new and of a good pattern, and were 
recently built by the Eogers Company of Wilmington, 
Delaware. 

For the first hundred miles or so there is no danger of 
a drenching, for it never rains on this arid coast, as the 



124 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

sterile, parched mountains, through which we wend our 
way, declare. Their very barrenness is impressive, it is 
so absolute and uncompromising. Not a bit of sage 
brush or grease wood, even. Now and then a prickly 
cactus shows its head and builds itself up like the pipes 
of an organ, but, for many, many miles, even this plant of 
the desert cannot grow. 

Soon the engine begins to puff and labour, and we feel 
that we are rising in the world. In less than twenty 
miles "we mount more than 3,000 feet, and the ascent is 
but just begun. Yawning gullies are on one side, tower- 
ing peaks on the other. There are no tunnels on this 
line, or at least only one in 300 miles, but the road winds 
around the head of all the ravines that cut into the 
mountainsides, and skirts the edge of the Andes, often 
hanging to the narrowest shelf of rock, while a thousand 
feet below is — destruction. 

But it is not all bitter barrenness. Way down in that 
cleft of the mountains, so far down that the eye can just 
perceive it, is a ribbon of green, and if we could get there 
we should find a narrow valley clothed with the heaviest 
alfalfa, where grapes and figs and oranges and pome- 
granates grow, all of which are brought for sale to the 
stations above by slatternly Peruvian women, and un- 
speakably dirty Peruvian boys. 

At a height of about 7, 500 feet a wonderful scene bursts 
upon the eye. The valley of the Chili Eiver widens into 
a broad expanse, green with Indian corn, wheat, barley, 
potatoes and alfalfa, and well up in this valley is the city 
of Arequipa, with its imposing cathedral, its many 
churches, and public buildings, and above all, its Har- 
vard Observatory, while ragged, rugged Chachani and 
symmetrical Misti domiDate the city, as Table Mountain 
dominates Cape Town. Both of these magnificent moun- 
tains are nearly 20,000 feet high, and Misti is as regular 



THE SWITZEELAND OF SOUTH AMEEIOA 125 

in its conical beauty as Fujiyama, wMcli it very much 
resembles, though it is fully 6,000 feet higher. 

But we will not stop in Arequipa for we have not yet 
nearly reached the border of Bolivia. The next morning 
our train pushes on again, around other fathomless 
ravines, skirting other sky -piercing mountains, always 
upon the edge of a tremendous precipice, except where 
the road crosses a high plateau, between two ranges of the 
Andes. 

One curious feature of the plains of the lower Andes is 
the travelling sand-hills. The prevailing colour of the 
mountains is a rich reddish brown, but these sand-hills, 
apparently blowing up from the sea, are composed of fine, 
white, drifting sand. As the wind drives the sand up 
the hillock, it falls down on the other side, forming a 
well-defined crescent, with the two horns pointing away 
from the prevailing direction of the wind. These travel- 
ling sand-hills, which are sometimes twenty feet high, and 
contain thousands of tons of sand, move along with a 
steady march in one direction, at the rate of several 
inches a day. No obstacle can stop them. When they 
come to a railway track all the line men cannot stay their 
progress, and either the hills must be shovelled off by 
many hours or days of work, or the track must be taken 
up and laid on the other side, for the moving sand is 
more resistless than an army with banners. 

Up, up, ever up, the railway climbs. At last after 
some twenty hours of steady ascent from Mollendo, the 
highest pass, 14,666 feet above the sea, is reached. We 
are nearly at the height of the top of Mt. Blanc, but the 
snow line in these tropics fifteen degrees from the equator, 
is 2,000 feet higher still. On all sides are these mag- 
nificent snow mountains, some of the highest in the world. 

At a height of about 10,000 feet even the cactus gets 
discouraged and only some tussocky grass, made possible 



126 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

by the rains which are frequent here, and a kind of 
resinous moss much used for fuel, are found. But on 
this poor herbage great flocks of sheep, Hamas, and 
alpacas thrive, and occasionally a yellow vicufia scampers 
away as the train approaches. 

The eye gets satiated with mountains after two days of 
such travel. It can take in no more Alpine wonders. 
We thread a precipitous mountainside without a shud- 
der, and calmly look down into an abysmal ravine on 
either Side without any emotion. 

As we approach Bolivia the railway descends some 
2,000 feet until it comes to Lake Titicaca, some 12,500 
feet above the sea, a lake which is divided about evenly 
between Peru and Bolivia. In many respects this is the 
most wonderfal lake in the world, as it is certainly the 
highest in altitude of any of the great lakes. Think of 
Lake Geneva, increased in size many times, until it is as 
large as all the Swiss lakes together, raised nearly two 
miles and a half in the air, and surrounded by peaks 
three times the height of the Eocher de Naye or the Dent 
du Midi, and one has some conception of this enormous 
reservoir among the Andes. This great lake, though it 
receives the waters of twenty rivers, has but one outlet, 
the sluggish Desaguardo river, through which part of its 
waters flow into Lake Poopo, another very large body of 
water, that lies at a somewhat lower level. But where 
do the waters go then ? No one can tell, for Poopo has 
apparently no outlet. Probably an underground river 
carries off the surplus waters of both lakes into the 
Pacific, 300 miles away, for it is said that a certain kind 
of small fish found in Lake Titicaca and Lake Poopo are 
also found in the ocean opposite these highland seas, and 
nowhere else. 

Two or three fairly comfortable steamers of consider- 
able size ply the waters of Titicaca, and the journey from 



THE SWITZEELAXD OF SOUTH AMEEIOA 127 

one end to the other, though only 120 miles in length, 
takes a night and half a day. 

The natives navigate a curious craft called a balsa, a 
small sail boat made of coarse rushes that grow abun- 
dantly on the shores of the lake. These reed boats will 
withstand the heavy seas which frequently roll against 
the shores of Titicaca, but after a few weeks become 
water-logged, and have to be hauled up for repairs, — i. e., 
to be dried in the sun, thus regaining their buoyancy. 

We crossed the lake for the first time on the Goya, a 
steamer built in England and transported in small sec- 
tions to these almost inaccessible fastnesses of the Andes, 
and here put together, to sail the cold waters of this 
mountain lake. In Peruvian revolutions the Goya has 
witnessed exciting scenes, and contains many a bullet 
hole to show where the contending factions have fought 
for her possession, and many a blood stain, it is said, 
where one side or the other has bit the dust, or rather the 
. dirt, on her deck. There is plenty of dirt to bite, surely, 
in any part of the boat, and the galley and the cook are 
probably the two dirtiest objects inanimate and animate, 
to be found in Peru or Bolivia. The Inea is a larger, 
cleaner, newer boat, which also plies these waters. May 
it always be the fortune of my readers to find her waiting 
for them when they essay to cross Titicaca. 

Most attractive are the shores of Titicaca on a bright 
summer's day. In the middle of the lake we pass the 
famous Titicaca island, where the great God of the Incas, 
the first emperor, had his traditional birth, and where 
are the remains of an enormous and most interesting 
temple. The shores, on either side, are well cultivated 
in many places, and terraces reaching far up on the hill- 
side attest the industry and skill of the ancient Incas. 
From this enormous plain, surrounding Titicaca, came 
the great conquering race of Bolivia, which, 700 years 



128 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

ago, swept north over the table-lands of Peru and 
Ecuador, carrying all before them, until they were the 
acknowledged rulers of South America, building their 
cities, their palaces, and their temples whose ruins are 
still the wonder of the world. 

On a bright day in the rainy season the shores of 
Titicaca are peculiarly attractive. The fresh vegetation 
of livid green contrasts with belts of red soil giving a 
rich and varied hue to the nearer hills, while the great 
mount'ains, lUimani and Sorato, always snow-clad, rising 
twenty-two thousand feet above the sea, and ten thousand 
feet above the lake, seem to guard the ancient possessions 
of the Incas, with their impenetrable ribs of rock and 
ice. 

On the Bolivian side of the lake we take the railway 
again for a ride of sixty miles across a gradually descend- 
ing plain to La Paz, the seat of government of this moun- 
tain republic. Past miserable little mud villages the 
train crawls, past flocks of sheep and llamas guarded by 
dirty shepherds, drenched by frequent rains, past plowed 
fields turned up with the same kind of a rude crooked 
stick which the Incas used a half century ago, until the 
most surprising sight of all our journey breaks upon our 
view. 

Nothing is to be seen for miles and miles but this vast 
level plain, some ten thousand square miles in extent, 
with the great mountains of Bolivia beyond, twenty of 
which rise to an elevation of nearly, if not quite, 20,000 
feet. Suddenly we come to the edge of what seems to be 
a deep, wide crater, but is really a great hollow in the 
plateau, made by the erosion of water, and there, looking 
down into this vast hole in the earth, twelve hundred 
feet below, we see the city of La Paz, with its red-tiled 
roofs, its great churches, public buildings, plazas and 
market places. Nothing in all my travels has ever struck 



THE SWITZEELAND OF SOUTH AMEEICA 129 

me with more amazement, so sudden and unexpected is 
the sight of the great, ragged valley, in which nestles a 
city of 70,000 people, wholly hidden from view, until one 
peers over the edge of the sheltering cliff. 

A modern American trolley car takes one down the 
side of the crater, by many zigzags into the city, which 
is the real, though not the nominal, capital of Bolivia, 
the latest republic of South America to feel the throb of 
modern life, but one that is waking up with marvellous 
rapidity, one that has resources unequalled by any coun- 
try of its size in the world — a country that with a good 
government and an untrammelled, enlightened religious 
life, doubtless has a future commensurate with the heights 
of its mountains, the depths of its valleys, and the extent 
of its vast plateaus. 



XVI 

THE HERMIT REPUBLIC OF THE ANDES 

The Worst Seaport In the World— Reaching the Outer World-^Bolivla 
and Utah— The "Seat of Government" and the Capital— Bolivia's 
Immense Territory — Her Magnificent Distances — Her Vast Eesources 
— Invigorating Coca Leaves — Chinchona Bark and the Quinine Pill — 
" A Table of Silver on Legs of Gold "—The Famous Potosl Mine- 
Silver, Tin and Copper— The Gentle Llama, the Camel of the Andes 
— Eeligious Liberty in Bolivia. 

IN some respects Bolivia is the most interesting Ee- 
public in South America, though, at the same 
time, it is one of the poorest and decidedly the most 
inaccessible. 

Far more remote from modern civilization than Corea, 
the so-called Hermit Nation, which has many fine sea- 
ports, Bolivia, after the war with Chile in 1879, lost heir 
little strip of seacost, which, at the best, was so remote 
from her centres of population and wealth as to be of 
little service to her. 

The only communication she has with the outside 
world as we have said is over a single track railroad line 
running from Lake Titicaca through Peru for 300 miles 
over lofty Andean passes, 14,500 feet above the sea ; or 
by a still longer and more difficult narrow-guage road 
from Oruro on the table-lands to Antofagasta on the 
Chilean shore. 

Two or three passenger trains a week, consisting of 
two cars each, and a few short freight trains every week, 
are all that surmount the tremendous Andean heights, to 
reach the mere outskirts of Bolivia, whose rich centre 
has never yet been pierced by rail or carriage rpad. 

130 



THE HERMIT EEPUBLIC OF THE ANDES 131 

Unlike Oorea, however, Bolivia is not a Hermit Nation 
by choice. Her isolation has been thrust upon her by 
nature and by the disastrous Chilean war, and now her 
people are doing all they can to remedy this remoteness 
and to bring her rich plateaus and richer mountains 
nearer to the rest of the family of nations. With a 
liberal and progressive and apparently stable government 
in power, in spite of enormous difficulties, Bolivia will 
doubtless succeed in this great undertaking. 

To picture Bolivia to yourself, imagine the state of 
Utah quadrupled in size, raised to twice its present 
height above the sea, and much of it spread out over a 
vast plateau, surrounded by mountains that rise to a 
height of 20,000 feet, while an occasional peak pierces 
the sky at an altitude of 22,000 or even 23,000 feet. 
Imagine the Great Salt Lake freshened and increased in 
size a dozen times into a lake half as large as Ontario, 
and you have Lake Titicaca. Imagine Salt Lake City 
dropped down into an immense crater 1,200 feet below 
the summit of the surrounding plain, and you have an 
idea of La Paz, the seat of government of Bolivia. I 
have said "seat of government" advisedly, for La Paz 
is not the legal capital, though the President of the 
Eepublic, the ministers of state, and all the foreign 
ministers live here. The Congress of the Eepublic 
convenes here, and all official business, except that of the 
Supreme Court, is transacted here. Sucr6 is the legal 
capital, but only in name, no government business, ex- 
cept that of the Supreme Court, being transacted there. 

In the last Eevolution, some dozen years ago, the La 
Paz faction triumphed, and one of the spoils that be- 
longed to the victors was that the seat of government 
should be theirs, while the empty name of the legal 
capital went to Sucr4 Before this, the capital had been 
a peripatetic affair, moving from La Paz to Sucr6, then 



132 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

to Cochabamba or to Oruro, or wherever the fancy of the 
ruling faction might take it. But during the last ten 
years Bolivia has won a new lease of life and prosperity, 
as we have said, under the enlightened presidency of Gren- 
eral Pando, continued by President Montt, who now 
holds the reigns of government. Under him the Hermit 
Eepublic of the Andes is emerging from her isolation, 
and taking an honourable, if still somewhat inconspicuous 
place among the nations. 

Bolivia has many things in her favour, — ^her immense 
territory, for one thing. No nation can become truly 
great that has not room for expansion either within her 
immediate borders or her colonies. Bolivia has room 
and to spare. The third largest in size of the South 
American Republics, surpassed only by Brazil and the 
Argentine Republic, no country in Europe is as large, 
with the exception of Russia. 

Bolivia extends for nearly 1,200 miles from north to 
south, and almost 700 from east to west. In all this vast 
extent of territory there are only about 1,600,000 people, 
a population much less than Connecticut's to cover a ter- 
ritory larger than France, Belgium and Holland com- 
bined. The white people of all Bolivia would not make 
a city as large as Providence, however liberal one might 
be in construing the word "white." More than half the 
people are full blooded Indians, degenerate descendants 
of the valiant Incas. In number of inhabitants to the 
square mile, the Hermit Republic ranks the lowest of all 
the nations of the world, having at the last census only 
ninety-nine one-hundredths of a person to every square 
mile, while Tripoli, which comes next in this respect, has 
one full inhabitant to the mile. 

But Bolivia is a country of vast resources as well as of 
magnificent distances — resources the very surface of which 
have hardly been scratched as yet. Its different climates 



THE HEEMIT EEPUBLIC OF THE ANDES 133 

at varying altitudes make every agricultural product 
possible, while its mountains contain every known 
mineral. 

From an elevation a thousand feet above the sea in the 
Amazonian region, to the plateaus of Titicaca, 13,000 feet 
above the sea, the country extends, and at those varying 
heights, tropical, subtropical, temperate, subarctic and 
arctic zones are found, and everything, from rubber, cof- 
fee, sugar-cane, and coca, to the hardiest grains and 
vegetables, wiU thrive. Several of these vegetable and 
mineral products are so interesting for various reasons 
that they deserve some paragraphs of special description. 

Coca, for instance, the plant from whose leaves cocaine 
is extracted, is one of the most valuable products of 
Bolivia. In no other country does it flourish so well. It 
is a shrub growing from two to eight feet high, and is 
cultivated in the temperate regions of the western plateaus. 
The third year after sprouting, a coca plantation begins 
to bear, and yields fifty per cent, annually on the original 
cost, and will last for thirty or forty years. The leaves, 
which are small and oblong in shape, are stripped off the 
shrub and dried flat, and are then brought to La Paz in 
large bags, where they are peddled out to the natives by 
the pennyworth, or sent off to France to be manufactured 
into the cocaine of commerce. 

As used by the Indians, it seems to be a harmless 
stimulant, for they simply chew the dried leaves, some- 
times mingled with a little lime stone, and you often see 
an Indian on the street of La Paz with his cheek bulging 
out on the side as though he had a big internal wen. 
Thus used, coca leaves are said to be slow, steady and in- 
vigorating in their action, enabling a labourer to walk for 
long distances with a heavy pack on his back, or to work 
all day without food. The results of cocaine, when used 
unintelligently as a drug, are deplorable enough, and it 



134 THE CONTINENT OP OPPOETUNITY 

is a question whether the Bolivian coca plantations are 
more of a curse or a blessing to mankind. 

Chinchona bark, from which comes the quinine of the 
drug store, is another important product of Bolivia, about 
whose benefit to mankind there can be no such question. 
Bolivia is the natural home of the chinchona tree and the 
very best quality is raised here. There are said to be 
6,000,000 chinchona trees in the country, and to every one 
who has taken a two-grain quinine pill, they are of in- 
terest. 

They grow on rough mountainsides 'a thousand or 
two thousand feet above the sea, and the trees are raised 
from seed sprouted in a hothouse. In about five years 
the trees attain a height of twelve or fifteen feet, and can 
then be peeled for commerce. They have slender, smooth 
trunks, and glossy leaves, not unlike an orange tree. 
Two or three times a year narrow strips of bark from one 
foot to ten feet long are peeled off and thrown upon a 
brick platform to dry. They curl up like cinnamon bark, 
and after being dried for two or three days are packed in 
rawhides and shipped from Mollendo in Peru or Antofa- 
gasta in Chile, to all parts of the world. A year or two 
after the bark has been peeled off the tree, it grows again, 
and the process can be repeated almost indefinitely. 

Sugar, coffee, of an excellent quality, rice, and indeed 
almost all products of the tropical or temperate zones are 
raised in Bolivia, and a walk through the markets of La 
Paz, Oruro, or any other large town, shows the abundance 
of fruit that the country boasts ; oranges, bananas, 
peaches, grapes, pears and apples of poor quality, cher- 
ries, grenadillas, avocado pears, and some fruits and 
vegetables that one rarely sees outside of Bolivia, are 
found in abundance, brought to the cold, arid table-lands 
from the warm valleys less than thirty miles away. 

The mineral products of the Hermit Eepublic are 



THE HERMIT EEPUBLIC OP THE ANDES 135 

quite as numerous and interesting as its flora. An old 
writer has described Bolivia as '' a table of silver on legs 
of gold," and this poetical description is scarcely an ex- 
aggeration. It contains some of the most famous silver 
mines in the world, and with all their enormous produc- 
tion, they are far from exhausted. Potosi Mountain, for 
Instance, is the very synonym for silver. In fifty years, 
in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, this mountain 
yielded in taxes to the Spanish crown three biUions and 
a quarter of dollars, and as Spain mercifully took only 
one-fifth of the product of these mines in taxes, they must 
have produced sixteen billions of Bolivianos (the national 
dollar) in half a century, to say nothing of what was 
smuggled out of the country. Potosi is still producing 
silver, though to no very large extent, and there are said 
to be ten thousand abandoned silver mines in the country. 
Modern machinery and methods of mining and reducing 
the ore, will doubtless in the future make silver mining 
in Bolivia as profitable as ever, for the silver mountains 
still contain fabulous treasure. 

As a matter of fact, tin and copper have been dis- 
covered in such large quantities of late, and of such a high 
grade that they have decidedly eclipsed the silver inter- 
est. In tin Bolivia is especially rich. For 250 miles, 
from the neighbourhood of Lake Titicaca, to the southern 
frontier, tin is found, and these mines completely throw 
the mines of Cornwall in the shade, and even rival the tin 
deposits of the Straits Settlements. In many places the 
metal is more than fifty per cent, pure, and both the tin 
and copper ore is so rich that it can be transported for 
scores of miles on mule back, for hundreds more by rail, 
for still other thousands by sea, before it is smelted in 
Europe or America, and yet be mined at a profit, in spite 
of all these enormous transportation charges. Perhaps in 
these days of high prices for the metal, copper is the most 



136 THE CONTINENT OP OPPORTUNITY 

important mineral product of Bolivia, for it is found in 
immense quantities and of remarkable purity. 

It is difficult to determine whether the vegetable, 
mineral or animal products of the Hermit Eepublic are 
most interesting. The possibilities in live stock raising 
are almost unlimited on the vast uplands in the neigh- 
bourhood of Lake Titicaca, where sheep, cattle, horses, 
llamas, alpacas and vicunas thrive. Of all these animals 
the llama is by far the most interesting and important. 
Wherever you go in Bolivia this attractive and gentle 
creature is in evidence. Look out of the car window and 
you are likely to see a herd of them scampering away 
from the train. Take a lonely trail through the moun- 
tains, and thousands of those little burden bearers will 
pass you in single file in the course of the day. Walk 
through the streets of La Paz, Sucr6, or Oruro, and every 
few minutes you will pass a flock of these animals with 
ears pricked forward, inquisitively and timorously, their 
long graceful necks stretched out, and their big liquid 
eyes full of fear and wonder at the unaccustomed city 
sights. 

They are a little larger than a donkey, and are of almost 
all shades, buff, black, white, reddish, and mixed colours. 
They partake of the nature of the camel and the sheep, 
for their wool is good for clothing and their backs are 
easily bent to the burden. They will plod along at the 
rate of fifteen miles a day for weeks, with a load of one 
hundred pounds tied to their backs, never asking for a 
drink of water, and content to board themselves on the 
grass and moss and leaves they can fijid by the roadside. 
Their only vice is an unpleasant habit of spitting an evil 
smelling saliva when provoked or frightened, but even 
this habit they indulge in but seldom, and on the whole 
are among the most gentle, attractive and beautiful ani- 
mals I have ever seen. They are almost as useful as the 



THE HERMIT EEPUBLIC OF THE AKDES 137 

reindeer to the Laps, for the flesh is good for food, the 
wool for clothing, the hide for footwear, and the bones 
for looms and spindles. A llama can be bought for five 
dollars in gold and is well worth the price, one would 
think. 

The vicuna is another animal peculiar to the uplands 
of South America. It looks not unlike a llama, but is 
really, I believe, a species of antelope. It has never been 
tamed, but its skin is prized for the softness and beauty 
of its furry wool, from which elegant rugs are made. 
Bolivia is also the natural home of the alpaca, but un- 
fortunately little attention is given to its development, 
and the exportation of alpaca wool has fallen to almost 
nothing. 

Eich as Bolivia is in all natural products, the problem 
still remains, how to utilize them and how to transport 
these riches to the outside world. To this problem the 
government is addressing itself with vigour and intelli- 
gence. Eailroads are being projected in several direc- 
tions ; — to connect with the head waters of the Amazon, 
to reach the Pacific through Peru and Chile at MoUendo 
and Antofagasta, and to connect with the Argentine rail- 
road in that great republic, thus affording another outlet 
to the Atlantic. 

For the manufactures of Bolivia, little can be said. 
They are confined to a few rude native products, and 
almost everything that the higher classes use is brought 
in from Europe or America. 

The school system of Bolivia is still in a primitive and 
rather chaotic condition, but the government is earnestly 
turning its attention in this direction. To Eev. Mr. 
Harrington, a Methodist missionary from the United 
States, the government has given a subvention of $35,000 
to look after the schools of Oruro, and, if he succeeds in 
this undertaking, as he undoubtedly will, for he is an 



138 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

able and experienced educator, the whole school system 
of Bolivia may be put in his charge. 

In August, 1906, religious liberty was proclaimed as 
the law of the land with only two dissenting votes. Bolivia 
has evidently started upon a new career and a happier 
one than she has ever known. Foreigners and foreign 
capital are pouring into the country. The American 
coloiiy in La Paz has more than trebled within three 
years. New routes are being explored, new mines are 
being opened up, new agricultural regions are being de- 
veloped, the immensely rich rubber country at the head- 
waters of the Amazon is being exploited, highways are 
being built, and, as I have said, railways projected in 
various directions. 

Bolivia is a country without a debt, without a tax on 
property, all her resources being raised by customs duties. 
She has millions of dollars in her treasury, the price of 
territory sold recently to Brazil, to be used for the de- 
velopment of the railway system both towards the At- 
lantic and the Pacific. When these outlets to the outer 
world are completed, as doubtless they will be within a 
half dozen years, Bolivia will no longer be the Hermit 
Eepublic of South America. 



XYII 

OUR WINDOW IN LA PAZ 

In the Gran Central Hotel— Twelve Thousand Feet Above the Sea— A 
Scene of Desolate Grandeur— Glowing Colours— The Headwaters of 
the Amazon — Female Flower Gardens— No Baoe Suicide — The Poncho 
— Human Burden Bearers— Donkeys and Llamas — Frozen Potatoes 
— The Beggars Coming to Town — More Commonplace Sights. 

OTJE window in La Paz affords no ordinary out- 
look. I venture to say there is not another in 
all the world from which such sights can be 
viewed, except perhaps other windows in this same 
Bolivian capital from which I am writing this chapter. 

In the first place, it is no light task to get to our win- 
dow. To be sure, it is only in the third story of the 
"Gran Central Hotel," as this very poor and very ex- 
pensive hostelry is grandiloquently named, and one has 
only to mount two flights of stairs to reach our window ; 
but those two flights make the heart palpitate and the 
breath come short, for our window is just twelve thousand 
feet above the sea, and the air is so rare and contains so 
little oxygen that it makes even the hardened native puff 
to mount the stairs, and the "gringo" (any foreigner) 
has to stop at least once on the way up, to regain his lost 
wind. 

But take three or four short, panting breaths, and then 
one or two long ones to fill the lungs once more, and you 
are all right for the second flight, which leads you to our 
window. It is worth the exertion, for it is a wonderful 
view which meets the eye when you reach it. 

Directly in front of our window lies the Alto or edge of 
the table-land a thousand feef above us ; and we see that, 

139 



140 THE CONTINENT OP OPPOETUNITY 

high as we are above the sea, we are yet down in a tre- 
mendous valley scooped out by the action of water, — a 
great, broad basin hollowed out of the vast plateau of 
Bolivia, which is five hundred miles broad between the 
ranges of the Andes, and nearly twice as long as it is 
broad. 

The sides of our basin slope steeply up to the Alto on 
either side ; and, since this is the rainy season, the red soil 
is streaked in places with green, where the Indians raise 
a little afalfa or barley or a few potatoes. 

But for the most part it is a scene of desolate grandeur 
that we see from our window. It is so high that only the 
hardiest plants thrive, and the trees are stunted and few. 
The great basin of La Paz has been cut up by innumera- 
ble floods into many earth monuments, composed largely 
of stones and small boulders, many of them as sharp as 
the aiguilles of Switzerland or the needles on the coast of 
the Isle of Wight. 

Some one has said that man has built the ramparts of 
every other walled city, but God built the walls of La 
Paz. And so He did. He built them more than a thou- 
sand feet high on every side but one, and on that side He 
left but a narrow gateway through which the people can 
get out into the rich and fertile lowlands, or rather lower 
lands, that lie a day's journey from La Paz towards the 
Pacific. 

The colours that we see from our window are remark- 
able. The mountains here and there seem to be painted 
with yellow ochre. Occasionally we see a stripe of 
Indian red, while, towering up above them all, is grand 
niimani, one of the three highest mountains in this land 
of tremendous peaks, its head and shoulders always 
clad in spotless, perpetual white. 

The La Paz Eiver rushes turbulently through the city, 
its muddy, yellow waters dashed to foam in its eagerness 



OUE WINDOW m LA PAZ 141 

to get on to the Atlantic, for we have crossed the water- 
shed between the great oceans, and, after toilsomely 
climbing for four hundred miles from the Pacific, and 
after crossing two great ranges of the Andes, one of 
which at its lowest pass is almost three miles above the 
sea, we have come to the great divide, the roof of South 
America. 

To be sure, the La Paz Eiver is not a mighty stream, 
even in the rainy season, and in the dry season it 
dwindles to a good-sized brook ; but it is interesting as 
one of the head waters of the Amazon, and in imagina- 
tion we can trace its course as it swells in volume in its 
precipitous course, changing its name frequently, until at 
last it joins the Madeira, and then later on the mighty 
Amazon, to which the little river which we see tumbling 
through the capital of Bolivia, thousands of miles away 
from the waiting sea, is less than the drop in the pro- 
verbial bucket. 

But there are other interesting things to see from our 
window besides mountains and rivers and the edge of 
the great saucer in which La Paz lies so snugly. The 
level, flat, red-tiled roofs, covering so many acres, show 
that here is a large city, large at least for the heart of the 
Andes, a city of seventy thousand people, the most 
populous and important place in all the republic of 
Bolivia. 

Here and there the red-tiled roofs are broken by a 
church tower, the soft white stone of which it is built 
carved into many symbols in a rude but effective way ; 
and from the belfry float the musical tones of the fre- 
quent bells, calling the people to worship. 

Every picture gains in interest from the life which 
animates it, and the picture from our window is full of 
human movement and colour. A constant kaleidoscope of 
changing hues is that narrow cobble-paved highway be- 



142 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

low us. Here comes a woman in vuluminous skirts that 
stand out all around her, reminding us of boyhood's 
days, when wide hoops were fashionable ; but a feminine 
friend more versed in such matters tells us that the effect 
is produced not by hoops, but by very full skirts, and 
several of them, one over another. 
• However little we understand such things, we know 
bright colours when we see them, and of all female flower- 
gardens the Indian and Cholo (half-breed) women of La 
Paz take the prize. Eeds of all shades and tints pass 
our window constantly in these full, flaunting skirts, 
until we think the natives have all adopted Eugene 
Field's maxim, 

" Any colour, so long as it's red, 
Is the colour that suits me best." 

But as soon as we conclude that they all dress in flaring 
red, a group of women in yellow, sky-blue, orange, grass- 
green, or purple comes along. 

One can never look out of our window in La Paz in 
the daytime without seeing this moving procession of 
colour, the brightest and most striking to be seen on the 
planet. Cairo and Bombay are full of bright and gay 
costumes, but for pure, unadulterated colour La Paz out- 
strips them all. 

On their heads the women wear homely round chip 
hats, and often over their shoulders a dark manta, thus 
concentrating all their colour upon their wide, flowing 
skirts. 

Almost all of them, too, have a burden on their backs. 
It is often a baby, whose red-brown face and sparkling 
black eyes peer out of the shawl tied around his mother's 
neck ; for there is no race-suicide in Bolivia. Either on 
the back, or in front at the maternal fount, two women 
out of every three seem to carry a baby. 



OUE WINDOW m LA PAZ 143 

If by any chance it is not a baby, the woman is sure 
to have some other burden quite as heavy — a bag of 
potatoes or fruit, a load of coca leaves, or a basket of 
llama manure, their common fuel. 

The men are not so picturesque in their attire as the 
women, but even they are very gay — for men. Their 
characteristic garment, without which no Cholo is half 
dressed, is the poncho, which is nothing more than a 
bright blanket with a hole in the middle, through which 
the wearer sticks his head, while the blanket falls down 
in folds on all sides. Edmund Spenser's description of 
the Irishman's mantle in his day has been well applied 
to the Bolivian's poncho : 

"When it raineth, it is his penthouse; when it 
bloweth, it is his tent ; when it freezeth, it is his taber- 
nacle. In summer he can wear it loose ; in winter he can 
wrap it close ; at all times he can use it, never heavy, 
never cumbersome." 

Though the men do not affect such bright colours as the 
women, their ponchos are usually red, green, or blue, 
often with a border of still brighter colours. On their 
heads they wear a woolen cap like a Canadian toque, 
with big ear-laps that cover their ears, even in the 
hottest weather, and on top of that a dirty felt hat. 
Their trousers are of some dark material, slit up behind 
to a point above the knee, so that they may roll them 
up easily when walking through wet grass or mud. 

They, too, are burden-bearers as well as the women, 
and we often see one staggering up our street from the 
railway station half a mile away, with a trunk weigh- 
ing two hundred pounds upon his back. Anything 
from a pound of peas to a piano they will carry on their 
patient, long-suffering backs ; for there are very few 
cabs and no wagons in La Paz, and every burden must be 
carried on the backs of men, women, donkeys or llamas. 



144 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

And this brings me to say that the brute beasts that 
we see from our window are almost as interesting as the 
human beings. There is a long line of patient donkeys, 
each with his apportioned load, it may be a hundred 
bottles of beer, their necks stuck through holes in the 
case, or two great panniers of bread, one on either side, 
or four large milk-cans balanced in the same way, or 
perhaps a load of flattened carcasses of sheep, which 
have been frozen and dried until they are as tough as 
sole leather, and quite as dry. 

More interesting than the donkeys are the llamas, the 
graceful, timid, obedient little camels of the Andes, with 
their long, graceful necks and their ears pricked for- 
ward, scenting danger in these unaccustomed streets. 
They, too, have their burden, each of about a hundred 
pounds, which they have brought down from the higher 
plains ; alfalfa, perhaps, or barley cut green for fodder, 
or pineapples, oranges, figs, and bananas from the lower 
plains. 

Opposite our window a Cholo woman has opened a 
fruit stand, where she tempts the passer-by with big 
green grapes, purple figs, yellow quinces, and red cher- 
ries. She also sells cauliflowers, beans, pink potatoes, 
and some curious white things about as big as large 
marbles and fully as hard. 

No one unlearned in things Bolivian could guess what 
they are, if he should guess a hundred times ; but you 
would be told, if you asked a native, that they, too, were 
potatoes. Potatoes, of all things ! They look more like 
stones, little snowballs, anything but potatoes. But po- 
tatoes they are, frozen and dried, wich their skins rubbed 
off, and frozen again and dried once more, until they 
have lost their identity as potatoes, and become dried 
starch, that will keep for years. The Indians rub off the 
skins by trampling on the tubers with their bare feet, 



OUE WINDOW IN LA PAZ 145 

which does not add to our appetite for our next dish of 
Bolivian soup, in which frozen potatoes are a chief in- 
gredient. 

We see rags and dirt and filth unspeakable from our 
window, as well as bright colours and brilliant costumes. 
Dirt in layers, in patches, in scales ; dirt ingrained and 
ineradicable. And such rags ! 

** Some in rags, and some in tags, 
But none in velvet gowns," 

do the beggars of La Paz come to town, to vary an old 
nursery rhyme. 

To be truthful and tell all that we see from our window, 
we must record that the fruit- woman opposite does not 
spend all her time in vending her fruit and vegetables ; 
but, when trade is slack, she turns to live stock, and over- 
hauls the head of her little daughter. When she finds a 
particularly choice morsel there, she gives it to her, 
though she generally eats them herself. Disgusting ? 
Truly ; but, if you would know how the people live, we 
must tell you all ; and this is a not uncommon sight in 
La Paz. 

But there are other more wholesome, if more common- 
place, sights. There come a man and woman, both 
dressed in the height of fashion. Paris styles and picture 
hat for the lady ; Prince Albert coat, silk hat, gloves and 
cane for the man. The distant church bells call to mass, 
and neat, black-robed figures hurry through our street, 
with black mantillas over their heads and prayer-books 
in their hands, while behind each one a little slavey, 
bearing a prayer-stool quite as big as herself, stumbles 
along. 

Let us hope that the black-robed lady finds consolation 
and strength in her service, however formal and mean- 



146 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

ingless it seems to us ; and let us hope that she does not 
forget the soul or the body of the little slavey who trots 
patiently after her. 

Truly our window in La Paz reveals many a strange 
glimpse of life in the high Bolivian Andes. 



xvm 

ANCIENT AND MODERN CHILE 

The Topography of Chile— Blessed by the Absence of Gold— The Ancient 
Chileans — The Brave Araucanians — European Blood and European 
Names — The Heroic O'Higgins — Chile's Struggle for Independence — 
San Martin, the Hero of the War— Who Can Vote in Chile— The Pres- 
ident's Power— The War with Peru and Bolivia— The Last Civil 
War — A War Happily Averted. 

THE history of Chile, though following the gen- 
eral outlines of the other South American Ee- 
publics, has distinctive peculiarities of its own 
which make it of decided interest. In the nomenclature 
of some of our congressional districts it would be called 
the *' Shoestring Eepublic," being very long and exceed- 
ingly narrow, and extending from about the eighteenth 
degree of south latitude to the fifty-fifth, a distance of 
fully twenty-five hundred miles, while its average breadth 
is scarcely more than a hundred. 

Imagine the United States as stretching from "Nova 
Scotia to the Isthmus of Panama, running back from the 
shore as far as the Catskill Mountains from New York, or 
the Berkshire hills from Boston, and we have some rough 
idea of the general topography of Chile. 

Chile was greatly blessed, especially in her early his- 
tory, by the absence of gold and silver mines. Para- 
doxical as this statement sounds, its truth will be seen 
when we remember l^ow Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador, the 
Inca states to the north, were cursed by the gold which 
provoked the cupidity of the Spaniards, and resulted in 
the cruel wars and horrible oppressions that, over and 

147 



148 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

over again, decimated the people, and reduced them, in 
two centuries, to one-tenth of their original numbers. 

In fact when Almagro, the chief lieutenant of Pizarro, 
,to whom was assigned the southern part of South Amer- 
ica, pushed his way into Chile, in his insatiable search 
for gold, and found, instead, a pastoral and agricultural 
people, who knew little about gold and cared less for it, 
he turned north again, in disgust, raised the banner of 
revolt against Pizarro, and was promptly beaten and as 
promptly beheaded by that uncompromising tyrant. 

Almagro found that almost the whole of the territory 
occupied by modern Chile had been conquered by the 
Incas, about a century before the Spaniards landed on 
their shores. Agriculture in these long and fertile val- 
leys to the south of Peru and Bolivia, we are told, was 
highly developed ; " the people were clothed in substan- 
tial stuffs of their own manufacture ; they mined copper, 
tin and lead, and possessed excellent arms and tools. 
The tribes all spoke the same language, but each enjoyed 
a degree of autonomy under its own chiefs. Their habits 
were democratic ; they loved freedom and independence, 
the Inca socialistic system did not prevail, and each 
farmer owned his own lield and could transmit it to his 
children. The race was large and vigorous, the selected 
survivors from among immigrants who had been greatly 
improved by countless generations of struggle in the 
more rigorous climate." 

In this last sentence we have another decisive element 
in Chile's comparative prosperity and almost uniform 
success in battle. Her territory lies largely in the tem- 
perate zone, and even the part which comes within the 
tropics is so near the sea, and so affected by the cool and 
life-giving Humboldt current, that a hardy, vigorous, 
self-reliant race has been the result. 

Bat to return to Chile's early history. Having dis- 



ANCIENT AND MODERN CHILE 149 

posed of his rebellious lieutenant Almagro, Pizarro in 
1540 sent Valdivia, an able Spanish general, to conquer 
all the region to the south of Peru, He met with little 
opposition and indeed was welcomed by some powerful 
tribes as their ally against the fierce Araucanians who 
dwelt south of the river Biobio. A long war followed 
with these valiant and warlike Indians, which lasted with 
various intermissions for sixty years, and resulted in leav- 
ing the Araucanians masters of the situation, and rulers 
of all the land below the Biobio. This mastery they 
maintained during all the Spanish occupation, and it is 
only in comparatively recent years that these valiant 
warriors have really been incorporated into the Republic 
of Chile. 

Of late an important and successful missionary work 
has been undertaken by the South American Missionary 
Society of Great Britain to which this brave race happily 
and readily responds. 

The development of Chile in the seventeenth and 
eighteenth centuries was slower, but much more natural 
and substantial than in the Inca states to the north. She 
was not oppressed and ravaged by gold-thirsty tyrants as 
they were, and the wars with the Araucanians on the 
southern frontier proved a school of military training 
which developed many local heroes, who rose to high 
places of influence and power. 

Agriculture and stock-raising, being the chief indus- 
tries of the country, rather than gold and silver mining, 
proved to be a slower but far more substantial and desir- 
able basis of wealth which could not so easily be trans- 
planted to Spain, leaving the country impoverished as 
were Peru and Bolivia. Most of the landed proprietors 
lived upon their estates, and treated their labourers with 
some kind of decent consideration, and these labourers 
were docile and obedient. 



150 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

Thus the history of Chile wrote itself for the most part 
in peaceful characters for nearly two centuries, until 
the great upheaval came which, in the early part of the 
nineteenth century, wrenched, one after another, every 
province of South America from the control of Spain. 
To be sure, the inhabitants were ignorant and backward, 
and the common people lived in wretched poverty, but, 
compared with their northern neighbours, they were con- 
tented and happy. 

Another thing which has promoted the greater pros- 
perity of Chile has been the large infusion of European 
blood from different nations, especially from Great 
Britain in the earlier years of her independence. To call 
the roll of the leading families of Chile to-day, would 
seem like reading a page of the London or Glasgow or 
Belfast directory. O'Higgins, Mackenna, Walker, 
Edwards, Prat, Tupper, MacClure, Boss, Gumming, Day, 
are still the leading names, and, in most of the larger 
towns and many smaller ones, we see Edwards Street 
and Walker Street and Prat Plaza and O'Higgins Square. 

O'Higgins is perhaps the most famous name of all. A 
young Irish lad of this name, in the later days of the 
Spanish rule, drifted to Valparaiso from Argentina, 
and by his ability, military and executive, became in the 
course of the years, governor of Chile, and finally viceroy 
of the Spanish dominions. A good and honest adminis- 
tration he gave the people, and his son, Bernardo O'Hig- 
gins, was no less distinguished, though less successful, in 
the later revolution. 

The struggle of Chile for independence was a long and 
arduous one, lasting throughout the decade from 1809- 
1819. The last Spaniards indeed were not driven from 
her southern shores until 1826, though victory was prac- 
tically won six years before. 

In this tedious war San Martin, the Argentine general, 



ANCIENT AND MODEEN CHILE 151 

was the chief heroic figure, as on all this western coast. 
Lord Cochrane, the erratic British naval commander, was 
another large factor in obtaining the freedom of Chile, 
though he did not reach her shores until near the close of 
the war. But his energetic maneuvres made up for the 
lateness of his arrival, and he soon drove the Spanish 
fleet for refuge under the guns of the fortress of Callao, 
and made the coast line and the southern seas free for the 
patriots. He performed some prodigies of valour, which 
will always live in the gallant history of the sea, but per- 
haps the best service he performed for Chile was bringing 
in his train a number of Scotchmen and Englishmen who, 
remaining, and marrying in Chile, have now become her 
leading families, furnishing some of the eminent names 
we have before recorded. 

Since the war for independence Chile has suffered the 
usual internal disturbances, common to all the South 
American states. But her birth-throes have not been so 
severe nor as prolonged as those of her sister states. She 
has enjoyed more periods of rest and recuperation, and 
of late years, with the exception of one civil war, she has 
turned her attention to foes without, rather than foes 
within. 

One reason for this is that she has had a larger body of 
conservative landed proprietors as the backbone of her 
society than her neighbours to the north, and conserva- 
tive and business conserving politics have ruled during 
most of her history. 

The earliest constitution of Chile recognized the aristoc- 
racy as a ruling political element in the government and 
the constitution, even though amended, more than once, 
is ''the most aristocratic and centralized of American 
constitutions." To vote, a man must have an income of 
a thousand pesos or dollars, but as the dollar is worth to- 
day only about twenty-five cents in gold, it is not a high 



152 THE CONTINENT OP OPPOETUNITY 

property qualification. There is an education clause in 
the suffrage bill as well, but men who can read and write 
are generally allowed to vote, though the constitution de- 
mands both education and property. 

In theory the President has far more power than the 
President of the United States. He is not only comman- 
der-in-chief of the army and navy, but controls the judi- 
ciary and has practically an absolute veto over the legis- 
lature. This power, however, he has rarely used, and in 
effect the government of Chile seems about as democratic 
and more stable than that of the other South America 
republics. 

Little by little the constitution has been liberalized 
and the power of the aristocracy curbed without many 
serious internal commotions. Practical religious liberty 
is secured, though the constitution recognizes only the 
state church. Civil marriage, a great boon, has also 
been secured by the people. 

The war with Spain in 1865 was one of the marked 
events in later Chilean history. Spain's strong navy had 
the coast at its mercy, but accomplished nothing perma- 
nent in the way of humbling her former colony, beyond 
bombarding Valparaiso, where ten millions of dollars' 
worth of property was destroyed, in three hours and a 
half. Then the Spanish fleet sailed away, without even 
extracting the demanded apology for alleged insults from 
the Chileans, 

During all these years and up to the present time, with 
the usual interruptions, to which all nations are subject, 
the financial and commercial prosperity of Chile has con- 
tinued. Foreigners, especially Germans, have flocked 
into the country of late years and have often made them- 
selves rich by their energy in exploiting the resources of 
the country. 

In 1879 when the fortunes of Chile had suffered a 



ANCIENT AND MODEEN CHILE 153 

temporary reverse, and her revenues were at their lowest 
ebb, her war with the allies Peru and Bolivia for the 
nitrate beds, though considered by many an unjust war, 
recuperated her resources, and by a single victory over 
the celebrated ironclad Huascar, commanded by the 
heroic Admiral Grau, Chile captured the chief source of 
her enemies, and was able to double her wealth of both 
revenues in a single month. 

The great event of the last decade of the nineteenth 
century was the civil war between the party of President 
Balmaceda, who had been elected by the liberals, and 
the congressional party who represented the conserva- 
tives. The President retained command of the land 
forces, and the Congressionalists captured the navy in 
the early days of the struggle. With this they terrorized 
the coast, blockaded the principal ports, captured the 
nitrate fields, and, with them, most of the revenues of 
the country, and soon routed the Balmacedists, horse, 
foot and dragoons. President Balmaceda took refuge in 
the Argentine legation where he remained unknown to 
his enemies who had captured Santiago, the capital, 
until the last day of his term of office, when he com- 
mitted suicide, from a lofty but mistaken view of 
patriotism and friendship, that his death might unify 
the warring factions, and relieve his friends of the 
Argentine legation of any responsibility for his escape. 

Since that disastrous civil war, Chile has enjoyed 
peace, though she has been on the brink of war more 
than once with her powerful and rapidly growing neigh- 
bour to the east, the Argentine Eepublic. Both countries 
nearly impoverished themselves in the purchase of iron- 
clads in anticipation of war, but in 1898 a conflict was 
averted by the arbitration of the American minister, and 
in 1902 by the intervention of England, and now happily 
the ironclads are for sale. An heroic figure of the Christ, 



154 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

the Prince of Peace, on the very highest point of the 
Andean pass between the two countries, happily tells of 
the triumph of arbitration over war. 

Just now (1907) Chile seems to be in a period of de- 
pression compared with Peru, Bolivia and Argentina. 
President Montt has many enemies within the govern- 
ment, who often thwart his well-meant efforts ; the cur- 
rency of the country is greatly depreciated, being worth 
only about half as much as that of Peru, which is on a 
gold basis ; and Valparaiso, the chief commercial city, 
was sorely smitten in the awful earthquake of 1906, 
which destroyed so many thousands of lives and so many 
millions of property. 

But Valparaiso is already rising from her ruins, and 
her ashes, and Chile will doubtless come forth from this 
present depression in her fortunes, stronger and more 
stable than ever, as she has so often emerged from more 
serious troubles in the past. 



THE WEALTH OF CHILE 

A. Sombre, Monotonous Scene— The Jewel in the Eough Casket— The 
Animal Life on the Chilean Coast— How the Guano Islands are Made 
—The Lobos Islands- The Nitrate Business of Antofagasta— Shooting 
the Chute— The Origin of the Nitrate Beds— The "Nevada" of the 
Andes— How the Nitrate is Extracted— How Long Will It Last— The 
Bitter Antipathy of Peru— What the United States Sends to Chile. 

AS I write I am sitting on the upper deck of 
the Chilean steamer, Loa, in the rough, surf- 
lashed roadstead of Antofagasta. Behind one 
of the dreariest, dullest looking towns in the world, rise 
some of the dullest, dreariest hills that my eyes ever 
rested on. They are not high enough to be grand. 
There is not a tree or a blade of grass or a flower or even 
a cactus plant to be seen as far as the eye can reach in 
any direction. The dun-coloured houses can hardly be 
distinguished from the dun-coloured foot-hills of the 
Andes into which they seem to melt. One or two great 
copper smelters, idle because it does not pay to work 
them any longer, only add to the sombre, hopeless 
monotony of the scene. 

For hundreds of miles on either side of Antofagasta, 
the same unpromising scene greets the eye ; dull, brown, 
rainless, verdureless hills and surf-washed shores, entirely 
inaccessible in most places because of the heavy Pacific 
swell. Yet in this miserable harbour of Antofagasta, 
one of the worst and most dangerous in the world, I can 
count at this moment more than a dozen large steamers 
from all parts of the world, and more than twenty great 

156 



156 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

square-rigged sailing ships, all drawing full cargoes from 
this unpromising coast. 

Behind these dreary hills of sand and rock lies the 
wealth of Golconda, which the rapacity of three hundred 
years of Spanish rule and the recklessness of recent re- 
publican days have not been able to squander. It is in- 
teresting to enquire further about the jewel enclosed in 
such a rough casket, as the wealth of Chile. 

This consists largely in copper, nitrate and guano, 
though much tin, silver, quinine, coca, and other pro- 
ductions of isolated Bolivia, for which Chile gets the 
credit, come through these ports. 

Copper mining and smelting are much the same in all 
parts of the world, whether in Montana, Michigan or 
Chile, and I need not dwell on this source of Chilean 
wealth, except to say that there are probably no richer 
mines in the world than those of the west coast of South 
America, and they are being developed, and their yellow 
treasures extracted on a larger and larger scale every 
year, by American and European capitalists. 

But guano and nitrate present sources of wealth that 
have unique and interesting features, and Chile controls 
the world's supply of both these fertilizers. If Horace 
Greeley's dictum about the man who makes two blades 
of grass to grow where one grew before, is true, what 
shall we say of the country that supplies plant food 
enough to nourish four blades of grass on the sterilest 
New England farms, where none grew before ! 

Manure may not seem a very savoury subject, but it is 
a vastly important one in the world's economy, and I 
have considerable sympathy for ''Elizabeth in Euegen" 
who spent on fertilizers for her German garden, the 
money her husband gave her for a birthday present. 

A few days ago in the long journey down this monoto- 
nous coast, the tedium was broken, as was remarked by the 



THE WEALTH OF CHILE 157 

flight over our skip of millions and millions of sea birds ; 
gulls, ducks, divers of divers kinds, and great pelicans 
with huge pouches hanging from their under bills. The 
sea was as lively as the air, and tens of millions of fish, 
large and small, in huge schools, were darting through 
the still waters, sometimes showing their fins above the 
surface, as they were chased by the larger monsters of 
the deep. 

Every second the keen-eyed gulls would poise on even 
wing, and then drop like plummets into the sea to re- 
appear with a fish in their bills, while the big, sociable, 
lumbering pelicans would drop in battalions, making a 
splash that could be heard half a mile away, and sending 
uj) foam and spray like a dozen park fountains. 

Their whole bodies would be submerged for several 
seconds, but they seldom missed their prey, which they 
would comfortably dispose of in their pouches, and then 
rise to pounce once more upon their quarry. After a 
time these greedy birds would get so much in their 
pouches that they could no longer rise into the air, until 
the first load was digested. 

The seals and porpoises and sea lions were as busy as 
the birds, and were constantly showing their shiny, sinu- 
ous bodies above the surface, as they chased the fish, or 
came up to breathe. 

This marvellous fecundity of life in sea and air, which 
can probably be matched nowhere else in the world, ac- 
counts for the guano islands, those sterile, gray volcanic 
rocks by which we had been sailing. These islands, so 
convenient to their dinners and breakfasts, these birds 
for countless ages have chosen for their night encamp- 
ments. Here they have brought and dropped the fish 
they could not eat. Here the seals have also crawled up 
to bask in the sun, and often to die, as it would seem, for 
it is said that five hundred tons of sealskins have been 



158 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

found ou a single island, and here, unconsciously, bird 
and beast and fish have been accumulating wealth for 
Peru and Chile, and fertilizers for all the rest of the world. 

For hundreds of miles along the South American coast, 
these guano islands are scattered. Near Salaverry, a 
long way north of Callao, in Peruvian waters, one finds 
them, and far south beyond the borders of Peru. In the 
war of 1879 they were largely taken by Chile, but not be- 
fore Peru had extracted a billion dollars' worth of guano 
from them and reaped a revenue of many millions for her 
national treasury. They are now partially exhausted, 
though the supply of birds and fish and seals is inex- 
haustible, and, as the birds are protected, new deposits 
are constantly made. 

The guano of the Lobos Islands, which the United 
States once controlled and then gave back to Peru, to the 
everlasting gratitude of the Peruvians, is found in pockets, 
we are told. " It is covered with layers of sand from two 
to fifteen feet thick. The sand is shovelled ofi", and the 
guano taken out. As it is dug into, so strong a smell of 
ammonia arises that men have to wear iron masks over 
their faces to keep the ammonia dust out of their mouths, 
noses and lungs. The guano looks like fine sand, which 
is first loaded on trucks, and then carried on a tramway 
to the shore, where it is transferred to the ships to be 
taken to Europe and America. After a few days at sea 
the odour disappears. The ammonia of the upper crust 
passes off, and the filthiness of the cargo is not detected 
until one goes into the hold." 

A far greater and more inexhaustible source of wealth 
of the west coast of South America is the nitrate beds, 
for which chiefly Chile went to war, and which she cap- 
tured from Peru nearly thirty years ago. The town of 
Antofagasta, on which I look whenever, as I write, I 
turn my eyes landward, is chiefly a nitrate town, and the 



THE WEALTH OF CHILE 159 

many large ships in the harbour are largely nitrate ships. 
To be sure, Antofagasta is also a shipping port for Bolivia, 
by which she is connected by a slender line of narrow 
gauge railway six hundred miles long, that stretches far 
up towards the centre of South America, but if it were 
not for the nitrate business, this busy port would soon be 
deserted. 

Two hundred miles to the north is the town of Iquique, 
the largest and most important between Callao and Val- 
paraiso, a town of 30,000 people, with good streets, good 
stores and several banks, and a wealth of shipping in the 
harbour, all dependent on the nitrate fields. A hundred 
miles farther north still, is Pisagua, a similar but smaller 
port, from which a railway starts that does nothing but 
haul nitrate and supplies for the nitrate works and 
workers. Besides these, there are half a score of smaller, 
but busy, ports where nitrate is the sole business. For 
half a day we lay tossing on the long rolling swells of the 
Pacific of the little harbour of Caleta Buena, to whose 
nitrate miners we were bringing supplies of cabbages, 
potatoes, oranges and bananas. 

.A precipitous cliff rises almost directly from the shore, 
and, on the face of this cliff, almost as steep as the side of 
a house, in four great chutes, nitrate cars were running 
up and down ; the full cars coming down, forced the 
empty cars up, like so many great buckets in a well, only 
that in a well the full buckets come up and the empty 
ones go down. So high was this cliff that the men who 
got off half-way down to adjust the machinery looked 
like flies, while, at the top, I could not make them out at 
all. To the top of this cliff the nitrate is brought in the 
cars, and then "shoots the chutes'' until it reaches the 
beach below, to be loaded for Germany or England or the 
United States in the ships that are always eagerly wait- 
ing for it. 



160 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

The source of this supply of the world's wealth, wealth 
that vastly increases the agricultural productiveness of 
many lands, is interesting and but little known. For 
hundreds of miles along the northern coast of Chile, in 
the territory that formerly belonged to Bolivia and Peru, 
there runs a low range of mountains, which rarely rise to 
a height of more than 4,000 or 5,000 feet, and are usually 
considerably lower. Beyond this coast range runs a long 
valley, north and south, for hundreds of miles, and, be- 
yond the valley, the high Andes rise, peak on peak, 
towards the interior. On the western side of this valley 
which is bleak, barren and forbidding as the worst parts 
of New Mexico or the desert of Sahara itself, the nitrate 
beds are found. In some places they are three, and even 
four miles wide, in others they almost disappear, only to 
crop out farther on. Sometimes the nitrate lies upon the 
surface, at other times it is fifty feet below ; sometimes it 
is almost pure, at other times the rock does not contain 
more than ten per cent, of nitrate, but, even then, it pays 
to mine and refine it. 

Some curious theories of the origin of the nitrate have 
been propounded. Mr. F. G. Carpenter records three : 
one, that the desert was once the bed of an inland sea, 
and that the nitrate came from the decaying of the nitro- 
genous seaweed. Another theory is that the ammonia 
rising from the beds of guano on the islands off the coast 
was carried by the winds over the range of coastal hills, 
and there condensed, settled, and united with other 
chemicals in the soil to form the nitrate deposit. Still a 
third theory is that the electrical discharges of the Andes 
combined with the elements of the air to make nitric acid. 
This acid, it is supposed, was carried down through the 
ages in the floods of the Andes, and deposited in these 
beds, in the form of nitrate of soda. 

No wonder that Mr. Carpenter adds that "none of 




ALONG THE ROADSIDE IN CHILE. 



A 


. Mlk...^:^J^^ 








% 




ii" 


...„_.„^j 



IN THE STRAITS 01'" MAGELLAN. 



THE WEALTH OF CHILE 161 

these theories is entirely satisfactory." That is a mild 
way of putting it. Each seems a little more absurd than 
the last, but who will furnish a better one ? 

It is known that the electric discharges of the Andes are 
on the grandest scale in the world. "Dry storms " often 
occur, and it is said that persons sitting in a current of 
air are sometimes struck dead by lightning when there is 
not a cloud in the air, or any apparent flash. The wind 
rises to a hurricane, we are told, and " the heavy electric 
accumulations in the air produce terrible atmospheric ex- 
plosions and violent detonations, while the surface of the 
ground sparkles and crackles with electric fluid. When 
this phenomenon takes place, men and animals and in- 
animate objects give forth a sudden, glimmering light, 
and the quivering, stifling atmosphere takes a reddish 
hue." 

While in the high Andes of Bolivia, and especially on 
Lake Titicaca, we saw terrific thunder-storms hovering 
over the mountains nearly every day, and my friends 
spoke of a curious feeling when the electric fluid was in 
the air, which they call the "Nevada," and which makes 
them feel cross and " edgy," though the day may be fresh 
and fair to all appearances. The " Nevada" affects old 
residents more than newcomers, strange to say, for the 
electricity seems to " get into their bones." So it would 
seem that the superabundant electricity of the Andes may 
account for anything, even for the nitrate beds. 

However they are accounted for, these beds are very 
substantial and important facts for the country that owns 
them. In a single month, after Chile had captured these 
nitrate beds from Peru, her revenues had doubled. In 
other words, all her customs revenues, on all other articles 
combined, are not equal to her revenue from this one 
article, of which she annually exports more than 
$30,000,000 worth, A million tons go to Europe every 



162 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

year, largely to fertilize the sugar-beet fields of Germany. 
Perhaps a tenth as much goes to the States, and is used 
for making powder and other explosives, as well as for 
fertilizers. 

The method of extracting the nitrate wealth of Chile 
from the soil is interesting and novel. When it lies upon 
the surface, of course it can easily be shovelled into carts 
or cars, but when it lies as it usually does below a crust 
of salt or other rock, two or more feet thick, it is a diffi- 
cult proposition to get at it. Then a round hole is bored 
through the top crust, a little larger than the body of a 
small boy, into the soft earth below the layer of nitrate 
rock. Into this hole a boy is lowered who places a charge 
of dynamite under the nitrate and attaches a fuse to it. 
The boy is hauled out, the fuse lighted, a tremendous ex- 
plosion occurs, and tons of nitrate rock are blown into 
the air. This is broken into smaller pieces, loaded into 
cars, and sent to the refinery where the foreign substances 
are extracted, until the nitrate is ninety-five per cent. pure. 
Again it is loaded into the cars, carried forty, fifty or 
eighty miles to the coast as the case may be, shot down a 
mighty chute, perhaps, in other cars, as at Caleta Buena, 
and from there shipped around the Horn to Germany, 
Great Britain, or the United States. 

When the big canal is finished at Panama, if the 
nitrate ships can afford the tolls, it will prove a large 
item of the freight that will pass through that redoubt- 
able ditch. 

A bi-product of the nitrate fields is the iodine of com- 
merce, all of which goes to a London firm, which has a 
monopoly of the iodine trade of the world. 

Five years ago it was said that at the present rate of 
consumption, the nitrate fields would be exhausted in 
fifty years. The rate has continued and increased, but 
new fields have been discovered, and now it is said that 



THE WEALTH OF CHILE 163 

enough nitrate is known to exist, to last the world for 200 
years more. The Chilean government owns all the un- 
developed fields, and holds the best of them at about 
$2,000 an acre. 

Such is the strange product of the soil that has peopled 
the barrenest, most inhospitable coast in all the world 
with thriving and prosperous communities ; that has at- 
tracted millions of dollars worth of capital from Europe 
and America ; that has enriched the two Eepublics that 
have gowned the fields ; that has caused at least one war, 
and may precipitate another at any time. 

Peru, as may be imagined, is very much exasperated 
over the loss of her chief source of wealth. ''"Weare 
only biding our time," you often hear it said in Peru. 
" We will have our nitrate provinces back again." 

"Did Christ die for all men?" was asked of a little 
Peruvian in a mission school. ''Ifo, not for the 
Chileans, ' ' was the reply, ' ' but for every one else. ' ' And 
the teacher could not make him retract the unorthodox 
and ungenerous statement. 

If the nitrate beds have made the fields of Europe to 
blossom like the rose, they have sown bitter dissensions 
and unending hate between the Western Eepublics of 
South America, and the end of the dispute is not yet. 

Of course Chile has other sources of wealth beside 
guano and nitrate, but these are so unique and exclusively 
Chilean, that they seem best worth describing. 

What does Chile take in return ? A look into the hold 
of our steamer would answer the question in part. Flour, 
kerosene oil, machinery, locomotives, cars, electric ap- 
pliances, lumber from Oregon, shoes from Massachusetts, 
furniture from Michigan, and a vast and miscellaneous 
assortment of goods from Europe that has come across the 
Isthmus and been transhipped to our steamer at Panama. 

It must be admitted that Americans stiU have much to 



164 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

learn about the South American trade before they get 
their full share. " Tell the American merchants," said a 
prominent railroad man of Bolivia, "that their represent- 
atives here must learn Spanish, and must pack their 
goods better, if they wish the trade." 

Too many North Americans regard all South Ameri- 
cans as "Dagos," and treat them and their language with 
the contempt which the word implies. As for the bad 
condition in which American goods arrive in these ports, 
it is proverbial. Articles that have to be transhipped 
half a dozen times, dumped into the lighters that roll up 
and down on the heavy swells of the West Coast, often ris- 
ing or falling ten or fifteen feet as the swell strikes them 
or leaves them ; goods that have to be handled by ignorant 
stevedores, who do not know a word of English or any other 
written language, and to whom "Fragile," "Handle 
with care," "This side up," are all "Greek" ; — such 
goods are packed as though going from New York to 
Hoboken. 

I have just seen a large consignment of thousands of 
American pickaxes unloaded. The iron heads were 
packed in ordinary flour barrels, and old ones at that, 
apparently. Before they reached Antofagasta the heads 
were knocked out and the sides staved in, of half of them, 
and the pickaxes were dropping out in every direction, 
sometimes dropping overboard as they swung from the 
derrick over the side of the ship. This is only one ex- 
ample of the notoriously bad way in which some Amer- 
ican merchants ship their goods. Until a reform is af- 
fected, they will not reap their fair share of the harvest 
of South American wealth. 



XX 

VALPARAISO— THE EARTHQUAKE-STRICKEN 

Valparaiso and San Francisco — No Insurance Balm — The Earthquake at 
Santiago — The Vale of Paradise — A New Spanish Armada — Getting 
Ashore and What It Costs — The Sears of Valparaiso — The Health of 
the City — The Benefits of Outdoor Life — How the Cemeteries Gave 
up the Dead — Twenty-five Seconds and Twenty-five Tears— Prices 
In Chile— The View From the Top. 

SAN FEANCISCO, Valparaiso, Kingston,— in this 
order were these three cities smitten by the direst 
of all calamities, in the quaking months between 
April, 1906, and January, 1907, and, of all these cities, 
Valparaiso undoubtedly suffered the most severely. To 
be sure, the absolute loss of property was perhaps no 
greater than in San Francisco, but the relative loss was 
much greater, and the resources behind Valparaiso are 
not a tithe of those which will rebuild San Francisco. 

The population of the former city at the time of the 
earthquake was about 150,000 (the estimates vary from 
130,000 to 180,000) while the metropolis of California 
claimed twice as many people. In all Chile there are not 
four millions of people, less than the population of New 
York City, while nearly eighty-four millions of people 
are interested in, and in a sense committed to the re- 
building of San Francisco. 

Conservative people estimate the damage by the earth- 
quake and resulting fire in Valparaiso at five hundred 
million Chilean dollars (say $120,000,000 in gold at the 
present rate of exchange) — a stunning blow, that, to any 
country, to have so much property wiped out in a day, 

165 



166 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

but particularly disheartening to a country whose gov- 
ernment is none too stable and whose currency sometimes 
fluctuates several points in twenty-four hours. 

Valparaiso's loss, too, was an utter loss, no insurance 
balm being poured upon the wound as in San Francisco, 
for all the policies contained an ''earthquake clause," 
and I understand that not a single claim has been settled 
or is likely to be settled on any kind of a compromise. 

In Kingston, which I visited only ten days after its 
destruction, the ruin is far more complete than either in 
San Francisco or Valparaiso, for not a store or a church 
or public building or scarcely a home was habitable, but 
then Kingston contained scarcely a third of the popula- 
tion or the wealth of Valparaiso and the absolute loss 
was much smaller. 

In Jamaica, too, the severe earthquake was very largely 
confined to Kingston, while in Chile a great part of the 
Eepublic was shaken. The evidences of the earthquake 
are seen in demolished houses, tottering walls, wrecked 
railway stations, all the way from Valparaiso to Santiago, 
a distance of more than 150 miles. Some of the smaller 
towns on the line indeed suffered more than Valparaiso. 
Llai Llai, for instance, which stands at the juncture of the 
Trans- Andean Eailway, was almost completely demol- 
ished, and many other small places suffered quite as 
much. 

Santiago, the capital and the most beautiful city on 
the west coast of South America, largely escaped, though 
even here the damage amounted to millions of dollars, 
and churches with cornices and pilasters knocked off, 
and public bnildings half in ruins, are common sights. 
Compared with the rude shaking of Valparaiso, however, 
Santiago received only the earthquake's love pats. 

Yet, as one approaches Valparaiso from the sea on a 
lovely autumn day in the last of March, one cannot 



VALPAEAISO 167 

realize that lie is gazing "at a city that lost in a single 
night five thousand of its people and hundreds of mil- 
lions of its wealth, and that many of its business streets 
are still lined with rent and charred and blackened 
ruins. 

The city lies on the slopes of steep hills that rise almost 
from the water's edge, and, after a journey of twenty- 
eight days down the barrenest coast in the world, where 
a tree or a blade of grass would have rejoiced the sore 
eyes of the traveller, the comparative verdure of the 
Valparaiso hills and the patches of green that indicate 
her little parks, are welcomed with delight. We even 
think that she deserves her name, the ''Vale of Para- 
dise," until a nearer view shows how long and black a 
trail the earthquake serpent has left in this Paradise. 

To be sure, the situation is by no means as fine as that 
of San Francisco, but the best preparation in the world 
to enjoy the beauties of Valparaiso is the interminable, 
monotonous journey down the west coast of South 
America, and I can forgive the glowing newspaper ac- 
counts I have read, which make this city the peer of any 
of the great seaports of the world, from the Golden Horn 
to the Golden Gate. 

As our ship drops anchor and the flag is hoisted to 
show that we have been "Eeceived" by the captain of 
the port, a new Spanish armada bears down upon us. At 
least a hundred row boats, each manned by three or four 
piratical-looking longshoremen, start as though a racing 
gun had been fired, each trying to get to the ship first 
that he may secure a helpless passenger and his baggage. 
In an incredibly short space of time they have reached 
the ship, swarmed up the side, pushing, crowding, fight- 
ing, cursing one another. 

The passengers are at their mercy, unless some kind 
friends from the shore come to the rescue, as in our case. 



168 THE CONTIKENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

There is no lawful tariff of charges for landing, or, if 
there is, it is never regarded, and the extortion of these 
highwaymen of the harbour, if I may be excused an 
Hibernicism, is most unblushing. They will often 
charge $60 (Chilean) for landing two or three people and 
their baggage, and one must make the best bargain he 
can. Before my friends arrived, I had beaten the least 
piratical looking of these harpies down to $15 Chilean 
(about $4 gold) which I afterwards learned was three 
times too much. However, we were so glad to get ashore 
at all, that for the moment money was no object, any 
more than it would be in getting from purgatory into the 
real vale of Paradise. 

The landing was at a miserable, slippery, surf- washed 
pier, and is quite impossible in stormy weather. 

Almost as soon as we reach the pier, the scars and 
wounds of Valparaiso become visible. Whole streets in 
the busiest section of the city are still blackened ruins, 
where, until within a very few weeks, fire has been 
smouldering. Acres and acres of the business section 
are to-day covered with burned bricks, blackened rafters 
and ashes, with no attempt as yet to even clear away the 
debris, much less to rebuild the waste places. Hundreds 
of thousands of dollars worth of goods of all kinds are 
piled up in the open air ; grain, provisions, dry goods, 
furniture, household utensils, guarded from the looters 
as well as possible by armed police and soldiers. 

Fortunately, as yet there has been no raia since the 
earthquake, but when the rainy season sets in, as it is 
likely to do very soon, the suffering of many of the poor 
people still living in temporary shacks is likely to be 
intense. 

Some of the wider streets for miles of their length are 
lined with huts built of corrugated iron, which, for 
months, have furnished shelter for thousands of people. 



VALPAEAISO 169 

Here in little seven-by-nine shelters they cook and eat 
and sleep. Here babies are born and babies die. Here 
people well and sick are herded together, and here they 
are likely to exist for months to come. 

It speaks well for the sanitary authorities that as yet 
no great epidemic has broken out. In fact the general 
health of the city is excellent, and it is said that many 
people of the better families have been greatly benefited 
by the outdoor air they have been forced to breathe since 
their homes have fallen down and they have taken to 
camp life. 

Marvellous stories are told of the recovery of helpless 
invalids, of feeble children and puny babies even, who, 
since the earthquake have been forced to take the 
'fresh air treatment." Many feathers may be plucked 
in Valparaiso to-day for the caps of those who advocate 
camp life and outdoor sleeping platforms. 

A ride around the city on the top of a street car is 
most interesting in spite of the sad desolation one sees 
everywhere. Here is a street stretching its grim and 
ruined length ahead of one for fully half a mile without 
a turn and without a single habitable house or store as far 
as one can see on either side. There is a great church, the 
outer walls caved in and heaps of unsightly rubbish 
where chancel and altar used to be. Near by is a school, 
or the blackened walls of a former school building, 
teacher's desk and scholars' forms alike buried under a 
mountain of adobe bricks and mud, which had been used 
for plaster. Here is a statue of Lord Cochrane, the de- 
liverer of the Chileans from Spanish rule, rising from the 
roof of a "tin " (corrugated iron) house, which has been 
built around the statue up to the top of the pedestal. 

In another place the marble effigy of the patriot Prat, 
so much honoured in Chile, is standing, but he has lost 
his sword, wrenched out of his hand by the earthquake. 



170 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

while it injured the statue in no other way, — so many 
strange pranks did the terrible "terremoto " play. 

Most gruesome of all were the scenes in the cemetery 
where monuments were overthrown, graves were opened, 
and rows of tombs, built like the Eoman columbarium, 
vomited forth their dead. Many of these were tem- 
porary niches for the dead, hired for a year and in- 
securely sealed, and when the great earthquake came, 
the corpses shot out of their narrow houses, as though 
the day of resurrection had come indeed. Even in 
Santiago, so far away, the dead were disturbed in their 
last resting-place, and great damage was done in the 
cemetery, which is probably the most beautiful in the 
western continent, — certainly in North America we have 
nothing equal to it in the magnificence and sculptured 
beauty of the tombs. 

But to return to Valparaiso — a ride around the loop 
on the top of an electric car convinces one that those 
who say that the city will not recover from the twenty- 
five seconds of earthquake shock in five and twenty years, 
are not far wrong. Certainly, at the present rate of 
progress it will be fully a quarter of a century before the 
last vestiges of the earthquake disappear, but these South 
American cities, I am told, have a fashion of lying dor- 
mant for a time, and then taking a tremendous spurt, 
and accomplishing the work of a decade in a year ; so 
Valparaiso may falsify all pessimistic predictions and 
rise from her ruins and her ashes far sooner than even 
her friends predict. 

Not that Valparaiso is dormant. Much building is 
going on, but the high prices of materials and of labour 
are at present a great handicap. Lumber is brought 
from Southern Chile, five hundred miles away. It has 
greatly risen in price, and is still scarce at any price. 
Labour is still scarcer and higher than materials. "Work- 



YALPAEAISO 171 

men wlio were glad to get $1.50 a day a year ago, now 
demand $6. Carpenters ask |8 and even $10 and a friend 
told me of one workman whom lie found lying in bed at 
ten o'clock in the morning because the best offer he had 
had for his day's service was only $6. 

To be sure, the rate of exchange and the rise of gold in 
part accounts for this, since the same money does not buy 
so much as it did a year ago. A five dollar American 
bill will purchase nineteen Chilean dollar bills, and no 
one knows when the rise of the rate of exchange will stop. 
It is changed nearly every day, Chilean currency steadily 
dropping with each fresh issue of paper money. Here is 
a country that is trying the greenback remedy with a 
vengeance, and plunging deeper into the financial mire 
with every step. 

Yet, considering the rate of exchange, some things are 
very cheap. A street car ride in Valparaiso costs five 
cents, — a cent and a quarter in our money ; a postage 
stamp for a foreign country ten cents, two and a quarter 
cents gold ; postage for a foreign post card is three-quar- 
ters of a cent gold, while in Bolivia it costs ten cents gold 
to send a foreign letter and three cents to send a foreign 
post card, and in the Argentine Eepublic postage on for- 
eign mail is double the cost of the same articles on the 
other side of the Andes. 

Living at the hotels of Chile is by no means extrava- 
gantly expensive, and for two dollars gold, a day, one 
can secure as good accommodations as he can get for four 
dollars in the neighbouring republic of Argentine, where 
all charges of the sort are on an exorbitant scale. 

There are not a few who predict ruin, financial, in- 
dustrial and political, for Chile. The republic is cer- 
tainly passing through troubled seas, but I believe she 
will weather this gale, as she has many another. 

An old resident of Valparaiso said to me : "Chile is 



172 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

like a young spendthrift. She has wasted her substance 
in riotous living. She took by force the nitrate provinces 
and the guano islands from Peru, thus enormously in- 
creasing her revenue, but instead of establishing her 
credit and securing a balance against a time of need, she 
wasted it on the army and navy and thievish officials, 
and now she is at the mercy of her creditors. Prosperity 
knocked once at the door of Chile, but there was no one 
at home to receive her, and she has gone away forever." 

Most of my friends, however, were not so pessimistic, 
and with the limited knowledge I could gather during my 
stay, I am inclined to agree with the optimists. There is 
certainly a strong, enterprising body of citizens, left to 
build up a new Chile. Much foreign capital is already 
invested there, and more is coming. 

The government, though beset with difficulties, and 
rent by dissensions, is apparently stable, and His Excel- 
lency, President Pedro Montt, whom I had the honour of 
meeting, seemed to me a safe and sensible, if not a brill- 
iant, executive. 

After all, the point of view has much to do with one's 
estimate of the future of Chile or any other country. The 
American muck-raker would make any foreigner believe 
that our own country was nearing the last ditch. Thank 
fortune, the professional muck-raker in any country soon 
discredits himself by his unfulfilled prophecies. 

Before leaving Valparaiso, I went up the steep hill 
which forms a background to the city, by one of the ten 
hydraulic elevators which connect the upper city with 
her harbour. From the top of the ''lift" I could see the 
wide bay with its innumerable steamers, sailing ships, 
and lighters. All around were the beautiful houses and 
gardens of the wealthier Valparaisans ; in the distance 
the fertile fields and irrigated farms, producing anything 
that any soil will grow. The seams and gashes made by 



VA.LPAEAISO 173 

the awful earthquake and fire in the business section of 
the city were largely hidden, for the upper city suffered 
but little. 

Then I said to myself: ''This is the true viewpoint 
for Valparaiso and Chile, not down among the fallen 
bricks and dust and dirt of the ruins, but from this fresh, 
breezy landing, one can see what the city will yet be." 

It can never be blotted out. There will always be a 
reason for a great commercial metropolis on this coast. 
Chile, with its vast stores of copper, nitrate and agri- 
cultural produce ; with its 2,600 miles of seacoast ; with 
its vigorous, hardy, patriotic people, has yet an im- 
portant place to fill in the family of nations. She loves 
liberty, fosters education, guarantees religious equality, 
and welcomes foreign enterprise and capital. She has 
had a notable past ; she will have a more notable future. 
Long may the lone star flag of Chile wave over a united, 
prosperous and free people I 



XXI 

THE JAMESTOWN OF SOUTH AMERICA 

Valdivia at Santiago— The Gem of the West Coast— Some Beautiful Parks 
— Saata Lucia the Lovely — The Westmiuster Abbey of Chile — The 
Grave of O'Higgins — Santiago in Holy Week — Women in Black Man- 
ias — The Sacred Images in Procession — The Instituto Ingles. 

SOUTH AMERICA has a Jamestown as well as 
North America, for Santiago is the Spanish for 
St. James and also for plain '■'■ James." Santiago, 
too, is one of the oldest cities of South America, as James- 
town is of North America ; for here in the southern con- 
tinent, before Virginia was settled, Valdivia, the great 
Spanish general, set up his standards on Santa Lucia, the 
wonderful rock in the centre of Santiago, defied the In- 
dians, and established the Spanish power for nearly three 
centuries in Chile. 

But here ends the comparison between the Jamestown 
of the south and the Jamestown of the north. The one 
in the north has largely stagnated, and is interesting 
chiefly because of its history. The city of the south has 
grown in importance, wealth and beauty with every dec- 
ade, until now it is by far the finest and most prosper- 
ous city on the west coast of South America. 

The open door of Santiago from the sea is Valparaiso, 
a hundred and fifty miles distant ; but the doorway does 
not fully prepare one for the beautiful city beyond, for 
Valparaiso is blackened and scarred and rent by the ter- 
rible earthquake and awful fire which in August of 1906 
nearly wiped it off the face of the earth. 

Then comes a hundred and fifty miles of dusty railway 

174 



THE JAMESTOWN OF SOUTH AMEEICA 175 

journey through a country which has not, as 1 write, had a 
drop of rain for nearly nine months. After climbing to a 
height of some two thousand feet above the sea we come 
out into a vast, well-watered, fertile plain surrounded 
by snow-capped mountains. 

In the midst of this plain is Santiago, the capital of 
Chile, the gem of the Pacific slope. Its great municipal 
buildings, its imposing cathedral and many fine churches, 
its tree-lined streets, its flower- decked parks, all impress 
one with a kind of childish wonder after the long journey 
dot^n the barren, rainless coast ; and the traveller is in- 
clined to pinch himself and ask his neighbour whether he 
is really awake and whether this is truly the same country 
in which he has been travelling so long. 

Undoubtedly Lima is a fine and interesting city, and La 
Paz has its own peculiar attractions ; but the tiresome 
journey along the interminable Chilean coast, with its in- 
significant nitrate ports, its tedious waits while the 
steamer heaves up and down, all day and all night, on 
the long Pacific swell, when one has nothing to look at 
but the gaunt, verdureless Andes, has dimmed the recol- 
lection of these cities, and has prepared one to view with 
most extravagant delight a really fine city that need not 
fear comparison with the best in any continent. 

To be sure, Santiago remembers that it is in the earth- 
quake zone, and does not indulge in skyscrapers, and 
most of the houses are built of adobe bricks covered with 
plaster ; but they are kept well painted or whitewashed, 
and present a very comely appearance, while there are 
enough really fine specimens of architecture in churches, 
private dwellings, and public buildings to relieve the 
monotony of the low, fiat-roofed buildings, and to give the 
impression to the stranger that he is in one of the first- 
olass cities of the world. 

Let us take two or three excursions together with Dr. 



176 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

Browning, our kind host, the principal of the famous 
boys' school, the Instituto Ingles, of Santiago. 

First, we will see some of the parks. These are 
worthy of any city. Even Boston, which rightfully 
claims to have the finest park system in the world, would 
not blush to own them. They have many features, too, 
that Boston's parks, owing to their northern latitude, 
cannot boast, — splendid palms and a multitude of semi- 
tropical plants and flowers. 

But the park of parks, a public recreation -ground that 
cannot be matched in the whole world, is Santa LUcia. 
This, as I have said, is a tremendous isolated rock, rising 
some five hundred feet in the very heart of the city. 
There are no other elevations for miles around, and it 
seems as if this great pinnacle of stone had been dropped 
down out of heaven to relieve the monotony of this wide, 
flat plain. 

The scanty soil of Santa Lucia has been supplemented 
by the gardeners ; trees have been planted on it that have 
grown to great size ; brilliant creepers trail over the rocks, 
covering their gaunt sides, and bright flowers bloom in 
every crevice and cranny. Man has supplemented nature 
in making Santa Lucia the most beautiful city breathing- 
place in all the Americas. Strings of electric lights at 
night take the place of the flowers by day. Fountains 
and marble statues appear at every unexpected corner. 
Cool grottoes invite one to linger in their shade on the 
upward climb, and a gurgling brook that comes leaping 
down the hillside adds its music to the songs of the birds 
in the trees. 

And the view from the top ! Who can describe it ? 
The great city with its nearly half-million of inhabitant's 
stretches at our feet, the parks and tree-lined avenues 
plainly picked out in green. Beyond lies the great smi l- 
ing, fertile plain that must have rejoiced the eyes of tl^e 



THE JAMESTOWN OF SOUTH AMEEICA 177 

conquering Spaniards 350 years ago, as well as all their 
descendants since. 

In the near distance are some shapely mountains per- 
haps seven or eight thousand feet high, on one of which 
the University of California has an observatory for 
photographing the stars. Farther off on the horizon are 
the great snow-clad giants of the Andes, rising twenty 
thousand feet and more above the level of the sea, and 
seeming to hem in the city on all sides. Beautiful for 
situation, if not the joy of the whole earth, is this city of 
St. James. 

K we linger too long on Santa Lucia, we shall not 
have time for the other beauties of Santiago, one of which 
is the great cemetery, the Westminster Abbey of Chile. 
There is a Eoman Catholic and also a Protestant cemetery, 
but what may be called the civic cemetery is the most 
ornate. Never in my life have I seen such a multitude 
of splendid monuments in one cemetery. The celebrated 
Campo Santo of Genoa, with its lugubrious weeping 
statues, is a small, poor burying- ground when compared 
to the great home of the dead in Santiago. Here many of 
the most prominent families of Chile have found their last 
home. Presidents, distinguished educators, statesmen, 
millionaires, and soldiers, some of them bitter enemies in 
life, have found a common resting-place here. 

Many graves are marked by great structures, almost 
palaces, for the dead, while others are marked by beauti- 
ful marble statues chiselled in Italy by the best sculptors. 
I was much interested in the splendid tomb of the Irish 
liberator, O'Higgins (liberator of Chile, not Ireland), the 
raw Irish lad who developed such military and executive 
genius, and who left a name in Chile as splendid as his 
tomb. 

The private life of "Oeegins," as the Chileans call 
him, would not bear very close investigation j but in ac- 



178 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

cordance with the old proverb, no hint of this is found 
in the eulogy carved on his magnificent mausoleum. 

Amid all this obituary splendour I could not feel many 
emotions of tenderness or solemnity, and should wish my 
grave on a little quiet country hillside rather than in a 
gilded, sculptured tomb of Santiago. 

Our journey took us to Santiago in Holy "Week, when 
the city was given over, as at no other time, to religious 
observances. On Thursday of Passion Week it was in- 
deed a strange and funereal sight that we gazed upon. 
Business was going on, but in a quiet, subdued way, 
while all the city seemed to be in mourning. This effect 
was produced largely by the women, all of whom seemed 
to be on the street arrayed in black dresses with black 
"mantas " over their heads. Not a woman in Santiago 
able to leave her house who did not go to church on 
Thursday and Friday of Holy Week, and not one who 
was not in funeral garb. Tens of thousands of women ; 
every street and square filled with them, and every one 
in mourning ! The very occasional picture hat of an 
American or English woman looked as out of place as a 
wedding wreath at a burial. Even most foreign women 
wore the black manta over their heads so as not to be 
too conspicuous, and to gain admission to the churches ; 
for this is the universal church head-gear in Catholic 
South America, and on the west coast a woman wearing 
a hat is likely to be mobbed if she ventures into a 
church. 

The great Jesuit church was the centre of attraction on 
Good Friday. All stores were closed, all business sus- 
pended ; and the people flocked by the tens of thousands 
to see the images brought out for their annual procession. 
A dozen great floats representing our Lord in Gethsem- 
ane, our Lord betrayed, scourged, and finally on the 
cross, were borne, each one, on the backs of scores of 




H 1^ 

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^a . 

M tf SQ 

« fe 52 

ta ^ K| 
S o !u 



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: J..:- HI 


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Bf;- J' ^ •' ^^ 



THE JAMESTOWN OF SOUTH AMEEICA 179 

groaning, perspiring men, wlio could carry them only a 
few feet before they set them down to rest. Thus they 
were borne through the streets while the assembled 
thousands that lined the sidewalks stood with uncovered 
heads in reverent silence as they looked upon these crude 
representations of our Lord's last sufferings. 

I must say that the scene was impressive in a way, and 
seemed to solemnize and, for a moment at least, hush 
the crowd. An American young lady in our party was 
made faint for a moment by the stifling crowd and smells, 
and had to retire to the shelter of a neighbouring door- 
way. " A judgment on the heretic," some women in the 
crowd were heard to say : ' ' she could not endure the 
presence of the Lord." 

The superstition and idolatry mixed up with such a 
celebration are hard for a North American to under- 
stand. They are hinted at by an inscription which I 
copied from the pedestal of a statue of Christ on the 
cross in the city of Santiago, which, translated, read as 
follows: ''^ By permission of the Archbishop of Santiago 
an indulgence of eighty days, which may be applied to the 
dead, will be granted to any one who will say an Ave Maria 
or the creed before this statue of the crucified Chrisf^ 

Who will say that Protestant schools and churches are 
not needed in such a country, where the highest ecclesi- 
astical authority grants indulgences to any dead scoundrel 
whose friends will say a ''Hail Mary" before a stone 
image of Mary's Son, whose authoritative word concern- 
ing salvation was, "He that believeth on the Son hath 
everlasting life." 

It is good to turn from such travesties of religion as 
these must seem to every Protestant to the spiritual faith 
represented by the Presbyterian and Methodist missions. 
The "Instituto Ingles," founded by the Presbyterians, 
is a splendid school under the care of Dr. W. E. Brown- 



180 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

ing, where nearly three hundred boys from the best 
families of Chile, Peru, and Bolivia are trained for large 
usefulness in their respective countries. It will do for 
these west coast countries what Eobert College is doing 
for Turkey and the Balkan states. The Presbyterians, 
too, have two good Spanish churches and several preach- 
ing stations in Santiago. The Methodists also are doing 
a large work, and their Santiago college for girls is a 
noted institution in Chile. 

One more incident of my stay in Santiago I may here 
relate, and that was an interview with His Excellency, 
Pedro Montt, president of the republic. He is an able 
and upright man, the son of one of Chile's greatest 
presidents. He looks not unlike President Diaz of 
Mexico, and his swarthy face, like that of Mexico's 
president, declares his partial Indian descent. He is 
most affable and courteous, and expressed his great 
interest in temperance measures, and his desire to keep 
strong drink away from the uncivilized races in his 
domain, a matter in which I was much interested. 

Our genial and popular American minister, Mr. John 
Hicks, of Wisconsin, accompanied me to the palace, and 
told President Montt about Christian Endeavour and 
its nearly four millions of members. 

'*Ah," said His Excellency, ''more people in this 
society than in all Chile." 

"Yes, Mr. President," I replied, "and some of them 
are in Chile." May a still larger proportion of one 
"million" soon be found in Chile, this free and beautiful 
republic of the Pacific slope. 



xxn 

THE FAMOUS JOURNEY ACROSS THE ANDES 

The Only Practicable Route Across South America— The First Hundred 
and Fifty Miles— A Night in Los Andes— An Early Start— A Delicious 
Climate — The Soldier's Leap — Starting on the Coach Journey— The 
Andean Coach— Views on the Way— The Numberless Zigzags— A 
Wonderful Statue— On Argentine Soil— A Perilous Descent— A 
Journey to be Eemembered. 

THEEE is as yet but one practicable route across 
South America, and that is in about south 
latitude 35°, where the continent narrows to a 
width of some 900 miles, and where it is divided between 
the two rival powers of Chile and Argentina. 

Of course there are other passes, if one wishes to risk 
the dangers and hardships of a journey of many weeks on 
mule-back, over the difficult mountain trails, and down 
the interminable miasmatic stretches of the Amazon or 
the La Plata to the sea, but, speaking in general terms, 
the only way for the ordinary traveller to cross South 
America is to journey down the dreary desert of the west 
coast by steamer for three thousand miles from Panama, 
until he reaches Valparaiso, and then by rail and coach, 
or on the back of the patient mule, cross from the Pacific 
over the rocky backbone of the continent to Buenos Ayres 
on the Atlantic coast. 

Even this route is difficult and hazardous enough to 
satisfy any one whose bump of adventure is not ab- 
normally developed. 

The first hundred and fifty miles of the journey from 
Valparaiso presents no difficulties and little excitement. 

181 



182 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

A comfortable Chilean train, built on the American plan 
and drawn by a German engine, hurries one away from 
the dilapidation and ruin of earthquake-shaken Valpa- 
raiso, over the foot-hills of the Andes, and through the 
dusty valleys of Chile, where (in March) it has not rained 
for at least seven months. 

One can make himself comfortable in a Pullman draw- 
ing room car if his inclination is for luxury, and eat his 
dinner in a well-equipped dining car. The heat and dust 
and other discomforts of travel are further relieved by 
clusters of delicious Muscatel and Black Hamburg grapes 
(or varieties very much like them), by baskets of fine 
purple figs, and good looking, but poor tasting, peaches, 
pears and apples, which can be bought for a few cents at 
almost any station. This (March) is the fall of the year, 
it must be remembered, and all kinds of fruits are in their 
glory. 

At Llai Llai (which, being interpreted, means Windy 
Windy) is the junction for Santiago, where passengers 
from the beautiful capital of Chile join oui- train which 
keeps on, headed for the high mountains, until it reaches 
Los Andes, where we must stop for the night. 

If the traveller has tears let him prepare to shed them 
now, for his serious troubles begin at this point. In the 
first place, he is bundled out of the train here in the dead 
of night, and must find a carriage of some sort, more or 
less dilapidated, which will rattle his bones over the 
stones of Los Andes at a tremendous pace for about a 
mile, until he reaches a very poor inn with a very big 
name, — the " Grand Hotel Central." 

Here he will be shown a not over- clean bed in a dirty 
room, perhaps occupied (the room, not the bed) by three 
or four other fellow beings. But he is so dead tired that 
he would be thankful for a rug on the floor. At mid- 
night he turns in, and at 3:30 A. m. the landlord sticks 



FAMOUS JOUENEY ACEOSS THE AN^DES 183 

his head through a hole in the curtain which divides his 
sleeping apartment from the family bedroom, and tells 
him that it is time to get up, as the coach goes to the train 
in half an hour. 

The traveller rubs open his sleepy eyes which he feels 
have only just closed, dresses hastily, drinks a cup of 
execrable coffee and eats a crust of hard bread cut from the 
loaf the day before, pays eight dollars in Chilean money 
for this accommodation, and is again rattled over the 
stones, through the black darkness that comes before 
dawn, to the railway station. Here he finds a comfort- 
able little narrow gauge train of the rack and pinion 
mountain road awaiting him, and while it is yet pitch 
dark the train moves off up the mountains to Juncal, 
the present terminus of the railway on the Chilean side 
of the Andes. 

An hour after the train starts the stars fade out, and the 
early dawn breaks over the eastern hills. First they 
grow gray and cold, the gray turns to steel-blue, the blue 
to a rosy pink, and, at last, the highest peaks are lit by 
the earliest rays of the sun, and another glorious day has 
begun in the high Andes. Indeed, all the days are glori- 
ous in this region at this time of year. Never is there a 
rain-storm, almost never a cloud in the sky. 

Few countries have such a delicious climate as Chile. 
It is seldom too hot and rarely too cold. The Antarctic 
current cools the air along the shore, and the mountain 
breezes temper the air in the interior. Nothing could be 
more charming than this railway ride. On the Chilean 
side of the lower mountains, there is a little vegetation in 
spite of the long rainless season, and around the poor lit- 
tle mud huts, which one sometimes sees, climb creepers 
and flowering vines, as though nature was doing her best 
to cover up their squalor. 

Everywhere the mountains grow from grand to grander. 



184 THE CONTmENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

Great white peaks that seem to leap 20,000 feet into the 
air, occasionally burst upon the view. In one place the 
train rushes through a narrow gorge over a shelf cut out 
of the solid mountainside, with a brawling stream a 
thousand feet below. This is called "The Soldier's 
Leap," because of the impossible tradition that a soldier 
of the Eepublic, when hard pressed, once took this broad 
jump. As he probably was not endowed with wings, the 
story is hard to believe, but the name is a good one, and 
the tradition adds spice to the journey. 

We are sorry when Juncal is reached, and we should be 
sorrier still if we knew what was ahead of us. Before 
the train fairly comes to a stop, there is a grand rush, 
helter-skelter, "catch as catch can," for the coaches 
which are drawn up in line, waiting for the eighty pas- 
sengers who are to cross the mountains. The theory is 
that the first coach that gets its load will be the first to 
start, and so will avoid some of the dust of the other 
twenty that will race on behind. 

This theory, like some others, does not always work in 
practice, and the first are often last, and the last first, in 
getting started, according to the will and word of the 
conductor, who accompanies the whole party. The 
theory however has the advantage of making everybody 
hurry, and, in a surprisingly short space of time, crack 
goes the whip of the driver, and the four horses, driven 
abreast, start off at a breakneck pace over one of the 
roughest of roads, swinging down a steep incline at the 
rate of twelve miles an hour, and then up an equally 
steep pitch at full gallop, until our breathless horses, 
thoroughly winded, stop to rest as do all the train of four 
times twenty panting horses, making a long line halting 
on the mountainside. 

Before we go any farther, I ought to describe one of 
these mountain coaches. Let not my readers conjure up 



FAMOUS JOUENBY ACEOSS THE ANDES 185 

pictures of swinging Concord coaches, balanced on great 
leather springs, or even of Swiss diligences with their 
comfortable and comparatively roomy seats. The Andean 
'' coach" is peculiar to the country, and, let us hope it 
will never be copied, but will quietly disappear when the 
railway tunnels the mountains and renders it obsolete. 
It is a very small cramped affair, holding four people 
when crowded. The seats run sideways, and the top and 
sides are covered with white canvas like a butcher's 
wagon. The canvas is buttoned down tight except at the 
back, to keep out the intolerable dust. The springs are 
very inadequate, if indeed there are any at all, and one 
feels to the centre of his being every bump and stone and 
water-bar in the long six hours' journey. 

There are two rival companies that convey passengers, 
but the coaches are equally bad ; in fact they seem to be 
just alike except that those of one line are painted black, 
and the other yellow. These companies are deadly rivals,, 
however, and their drivers frequently indulge in races 
in the most inopportune places, as we found to our 
cost ; for our driver being outdistanced by his rival, at- 
tempted to take a short cut over a little rise of ground, 
which was never meant for a coach. The coach tipped, 
the horses floundered among the rocks, and we saved 
ourselves from a serious smash -up by all jumping out and 
righting the coach, and walking up the hill until it got 
into the road once more. Another coach in our pro- 
cession tipped entirely over, but no one was hurt, and 
fatal accidents, I am told, are remarkably rare, consider- 
ing the fact that three times a week nearly a hundred 
people take this journey. 

By interminable zigzags the coach road mounts the 
mountain. Starting at about 5,000 feet above the sea, 
it climbs more than 7,000 feet in some fifteen miles to 
the summit of the pass, 12,796 feet above the sea. The 



186 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

top of Mt. Blanc is but a little higher than this pass, and 
Mt. Washington and Mt. Jefferson would dwindle into 
foothills as seen from this gigantic Andean range. 

Many of the views are sublime and such as can be seen 
nowhere else in the world. Eough, rugged, barren in the 
extreme in the higher ranges, Nature has done her best 
here to pile Ossa on Pelion, and to enable man to mount 
on them to the stars. In early April we found the pass 
warm at midday, and almost entirely free from snow, 
though sometimes it is absolutely closed to travel after 
the middle of April, and even in February tunnels occa- 
sionally have to be dug through snow banks, and mules 
have to be substituted for the coaches. The pass is usually 
open, however, for travellers from November until the 
end of April, and sometimes into May, but is closed during 
the winter months of June, July, August and Sep- 
tember. 

As we approach the top on the Chilean side, the zig- 
zags grow more numerous and arduous, until, in looking 
back, one can count as many as twenty curves over which 
he has come. The scenery, at the same time, becomes 
bolder, grander, more sublime. Mountain peaks, twice 
ten thousand feet high, tower about us, and we are over- 
whelmed by their overpowering vastness and sterility. 
Nowhere, except in Montenegro and the Canadian Eock- 
ies, have I seen such massive natural monuments, and 
the latter are relieved by vegetation up to the tree line. 
There seems to be no tree line in the Andes. 

On the top of the pass is one of the most remarkable 
statues in the world ; an heroic figure of the Christ, 
upholding a cross. On the base of the pedestal are the 
emblematic figures of Chile and Argentina clasping hands 
as a symbol of their settlement of the boundary dispute, 
which at one time seriously threatened war; a war 
happily averted by arbitration, which assigned the 




THE CHRIST OF THE ANDES. 



FAMOUS JOUENEY ACEOSS THE ANDES 187 

summit of the Andes as the boundary between the 
nations. 
Under the pedestal is the inscription 

' ' He is Our Peace 
Who Hath Made Both One.^^ 

The magnificence of the surrounding scenery, the isolated 
loftiness of the natural pedestal and the character, the 
appropriateness, and the beauty of the statue itself all 
combine to make ^'The Christ of the Andes" perhaps 
the most impressive monument in the world. 

Immediately after passing the monument we are on 
Argentine soil, and then commences a descent of some 
2,000 feet to the town of Las Cuevas. In some respects 
this is the most hair-raising part of the journey. The 
descent is very rapid, the zigzags very numerous, the 
curves very sharp. The driver whips up his horses, who 
also scent the oats in the distant town which we can see 
almost from the top. At breakneck speed we dash along. 
There is no wall and no stone posts, as on the Swiss 
roads, to guard the side, and every side is either a 
precipitous mountain or a fathomless precipice. Around 
every curve the coach slews with only two or three wheels 
on the ground, and the precipice only four inches from 
the outside wheel, but a special Providence protects the 
travellers, and we reach Las Cuevas safe and sound, to be 
sure, but covered with such a coating of fine yellow dust 
that our own mothers would hardly know us. 

The rest of t^e journey to Buenos Ayres is comparatively 
easy. A narrow gauge rack and pinion road takes us to 
Mendoza, some four hours away. Grand Andean scenery 
charms us on every side, with Mount Aconcagua (23,393 
feet), the highest mountain in the western hemisphere, 
occasionally visible, while other mountains scarcely less 
mighty, loom on every side. 



188 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

At Mendoza, which is among the foot-hills of the Ar- 
gentine Andes, we change again to a broad gauge road, 
where comfortable sleeping cars wait to carry us to 
Buenos Ayres, 650 miles away, a journey that takes some 
twenty-three hours. 

Except for one range of hills, the whole distance is over 
an absolutely flat plain, but a plain of marvellous fertility, 
covered with innumerable flocks and herds, and pro- 
ducing bumper crops of corn and wheat. A vast world's 
granary six hundred miles wide and hundreds of miles 
from north to south, are the prairies of Argentina. 

But this article has to do with the mountain journey, 
and, before it is ended, I may well answer the question 
which has already been often put to me, whether it is 
practicable and worth while for the average traveller to 
take it. It certainly is, if the said average traveller is 
willing to put up with a few discomforts. It depends 
largely upon one's previous point of view. 

Was it Mark Twain who said to the unskillful barber who 
asked him if the razor was easy : "It depends upon what 
you call it ; if you call it shaving it is pretty hard, — if 
you call it skinning it isn't so bad." So if you are think- 
ing of a pleasure journey, a charming ride over the Andes 
such as you would have in Switzerland or the Pyrenees, 
it is pretty hard ; if you call it getting across the Andes 
over a new, rough, undeveloped desert country, it isn't 
so bad. If you can stand dirt, heat and cold ; if you do 
not wince too much at the abuse of horses and mules ; 
if you can endure considerable extortion without grum- 
bling ; if you can see your trunks and other baggage 
pitched about and thrown over by the worst baggage 
smashers in the world ; if you do not wholly lose your 
equanimity when your trunks are opened on the road 
and the contents stolen, as mine were ; if you can " eat 
your peck of dirt" in a few hours instead of a lifetime, 



FAMOUS JOUBNEY ACEOSS THE ANDES 189 

and enjoy tkedirt ; if your nerves are strong enough, to 
stand a ten mile gallop on the edge of a precipice ; if you 
want to see the most magnificent scenery in the world ; 
if you enjoy a spice of adventure ; if you would have 
memories and mental pictures that will remain fresh and 
vivid for a lifetime ; if you would see the most magnifi- 
cent works of God and some of the most daring engineer- 
ing feats of man ; you will take this journey when you 
have the opportunity, and be thankful all your life that 
you have done so. 

At any rate, this route is far shorter than the alternative 
route through the straits of Magellan, taking only two 
days instead of ten, and it costs only half as much. 

In five years (or more likely ten) the tunnel through 
the Andes will be completed, and the whole journey will 
be made by rail. Then the route will be robbed of all its 
terrors — ^and more than half of its joys. 



xxm 

ARGENTINA, THE LAND OF THE LIMITLESS 
PAMPAS 

One Hundred and Seventy Miles of Rail Without a Curve — A Vast Plain 
— The Mesopotamia — Buenos Ayres, the Beautiful — The Early 
Years of Argentina — Strangling the Trade of the River Plate^ 
Buenos Ayres a Democratic City — The Brief British Occupation — The 
25th of May, 1810 — Separating from Spain — Revolutions and Counter- 
Revolutions — The U. S. Grant of Argentina, San Martin's Great 
Campaign — More Recent History — Future Prospects. 

IN crossing Argentina from the Chilean boundary to 
the sea, one receives an impression of boundlessness, 
of limitless extent, that he gets in no other land. 
Other countries have their hills and valleys ; Argentina 
is one vast plain. One almost feels that he is at sea as 
he looks out of the car window, hour after hour, and sees 
the same flat prairies, as smooth and level as the ocean 
on a calm day. Even so much variation as would be 
caused in the surface by an ocean swell is imperceptible 
on the pampas. For one hundred and seventy-five miles 
the railway track runs without a curve, and, for more 
than half a day, one can watch the absolutely straight 
converging tracks, until they are lost to view by the 
curvature of the earth. 

To be sure there are forests in the north and mountains 
on the Chilean border, but the part of Argentina that 
counts politically and industrially, and from ^n agricul- 
tural and business standpoint, is these limitless fields of 
grain in the east and pasture land in the west ; prairies 
that have already made the people, in proportion to their 
population, the richest in the world, and that seem 

190 




AN ARGENTINE FARMHOUSE. 




ARGENTINE INDIANS. 



AEGENTINA 191 

destined in the future to fill the granaries of all the 
western nations. 

South of Bolivia and Paraguay and east of Chile, 
Argentina occupies all the lower end of the South 
American continent, save little Uruguay, an extent of 
territory nearly half as large as continental United 
States, and within its borders, is probably less waste 
land than in any other large nation. 

There is a small section of Argentina between the 
Uruguay and the Parana Eivers on the western side of 
the republic, a country covered with rich grasses, well 
watered by numerous rivers, called the Mesopotamia. 
This smallest natural geographical division of the country 
contains 81,000 square miles, and is larger than England 
and " more uniformly fertile." 

Besides this there are 350,000 square miles of pampas 
suitable for grain growing, and twice as many square 
miles in the Andean provinces and in Patagonia where 
the flocks and herds of the world may find pasture. 

But Argentina is not solely a country of wheat farms 
and cattle ranges. More than a quarter part of its peo- 
ple live in cities, and one of these, Buenos Ayres, the 
capital of the republic, ranks among the first class cities 
of the world, being surpassed in size only by London, 
New York, Chicago, Paris, Berlin, St. Petersburg, and 
Philadelphia. It is the first city in South America, the 
fourth city in all America, and the second largest Latin 
city in the world. It is not only great in numbers, but 
beautiful in its architecture, and one of the world's great 
centres of commerce and business life. 

The development of such a country, with such a 
capital city, from its position in the seventeenth century 
as the Cinderella of the South American provinces, 
is well worth tracing. The early years of Argentina 
were marked by the neglect, almost by the contempt, 



192 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

of the mother country, Spain. She had no gold and 
silver, and therefore was not worth considering. Her 
magnificent agricultural possibilities and her splendid 
navigable rivers did not recommend her to the Spanish 
grandees, whose only idea of America w^as that of a great 
strong box filled with gold and silver that belonged to the 
Spanish crown, and this strong box must be broken into 
and its contents looted at the first possible moment. 

In the level alluvial plains east of the Andes there was 
evidently no coin and so they were not worth having. 
But they did give Spain a lot of trouble nevertheless, 
for through them ran a great river, and near its mouth in 
spite of all the authorities at home could do, a city 
called Buenos Ayres persisted in growing up. 

Now this city was a natural outlet for the gold and 
silver of Peru, as well as for the hides and grains of her 
own plains, but the merchants of Cadiz, to whom the 
monopoly of trade was granted, were so afraid that other 
nations would share their trade if Buenos Ayres were not 
strangled at the birth, that they made it a crime for any 
one to trade with that city, and decreed that all European 
exports and imports should be unloaded on the north 
shore of the Isthmus of Panama, at Nombre de Dios, 
toilsomely carried across the Isthmus, reloaded, and 
shipped in coasters to Callao, again disembarked, and 
carried by mules over the almost inaccessible Andean 
passes, over the great Bolivian plain and down the Andes 
to Argentina. Goods sent by such a route could be sold 
only at prohibitive prices, and the bulky exports of 
Argentina could not be sent abroad at all, by reason of 
the cost of transportation up and down the mountains 
and across the Isthmus. It was in fact a deliberate and 
century-long attempt to strangle the trade of the Eiver 
Plate, and to kill the city which, in spite of Cadiz, in- 
sisted upon growing up on its banks. 



AEGENTINA 193 

The Spanish crown to which America belonged (for 
America was never in the true sense a colony of Spain 
but a mere appendage of the crown) supported the 
monopoly because a fifth part of all America's gold and 
silver accrued to the crown, and if free trade were allowed 
or anything approaching it, some of this gold and silver 
it was feared might be smuggled in the bales of hides and 
wool. 

Such a deliberate destruction of trade, and forcing of 
it into unnatural and impossible channels, seems incon- 
ceivable in these days, yet for nearly a century it went 
on, and strange to say it was not resented or resisted by 
the colonists who never denied the right of the mother 
country to destroy their trade, but only sought to evade 
it by becoming the most expert smugglers in the world. 
So Buenos Ayres became a huge cave of Adullam, a 
smuggler's paradise. She can hardly be blamed for en- 
tering the only door of expansion or even of existence, 
open to her. 

At last, after years and years of these repressive laws, 
their uselessness, if not their iniquity, became apparent, 
and Buenos Ayres and the country of which it was the 
port, were allowed to develop in their own way, though 
without any fostering care on the part of the home gov- 
ernment, all of whose interests were still concentrated on 
the mines of Peru, while Lima was still the capital of 
all South America. 

The seventeenth century records but little of interest 
in the country now called Argentina. It was a century of 
slow growth, of repression by the home government, of 
irregular development by smugglers and law-breakers ; 
but in spite of all, of some progress. 

The eighteenth century showed but little improvement 
over the seventeenth, until it was well on towards its last 
quarter. Then the Spanish government, seeing the 



194 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

futility of its efforts to strangle the trade of a great 
natural seaport, and, alarmed at the aggressions of the 
Portuguese, who were pushing ^southward from Brazil, 
reversed their old policy and created a new Yiceroyalty 
of Buenos Ayres. 

This was in 1776, and the new Viceroyalty included all 
the enormous territory east of the Andes and south of 
Brazil, embracing the present republics of Bolivia, Para- 
guay, Uruguay and Argentina. Buenos Ayres, the cap- 
ital of this vast province, contained then only 20,000 in- 
habitants, but it already gave promise of its future 
greatness. 

It is interesting to note that Buenos Ayres was always 
a democratic city and from this centre spread the demo- 
cratic spirit over all southern South America. Dawson 
puts the facts of the case well when he says: ''Lima 
and Mexico were centres of aristocracy and bureaucracy, 
while the social organization of Buenos Ayres and its sur- 
rounding territory was always democratic. All were 
equal in fact ; neither nobles nor serfs existed ; the Vice- 
roy was little more than a new official imposed by exter- 
nal authority, and having no real support in the country 
itself. It is not a mere coincidence that the three 
centres — Caracas, Buenos Ayres and Pernambuco — 
whence the revolutionary spirit spread over South 
America, should all have been democratic in social or- 
ganization and far distant from the old Colonial capitals. 

"In Buenos Ayres the Viceroy himself could not find 
a white coachman. An Argentine Creole would no more 
serve in a menial capacity than a North American 
pioneer ; and a Creole hated a Spaniard very much as 
his contemporary, the Scotch-Irish settler of the Appa- 
lachian, hated an Englishman." 

It was not until the beginning of the nineteenth cen- 
tury that this democratic yea^t began to work, and to 



AEGENTINA 195 

produce visible and startling effects throughout all South 
America. Argentina first of all grew restive under the 
Spanish yoke, and alone has the distinction of being the 
only country that never again admitted the Spaniard, 
after once having expelled him. 

But before this deliverance came, an episode occurred 
in Argentine history which came near altering her fate 
and that of all South America in a startling way. This 
was none other than the brief occupation of Buenos 
Ayres by the British in 1806. This occupation, to be 
siire, lasted only from June 27th to August 12th of the 
same year when the British troops under General Beres- 
ford were beaten and forced to surrender to an overwhelm- 
ing force. In the following year the British again at- 
tempted to capture the city, but the women and children, 
as well as the men, took part in their discomfiture ; pelted 
them with stones and firebrands from the flat roofs of the 
city, while their husbands and fathers shot them down 
from every open doorway. 

After two days of fighting in the streets of the city, 
the British general asked for terms, and was obliged to 
evacuate not only Buenos Ayres, but to withdraw his 
troops from Montevideo as well. But though the British 
were defeated in battle, they soon won commercial su- 
premacy, for English merchant ships followed the war- 
ships, and free exchange of goods with all the world was 
at last established. 

Soon after this fiasco of British arms in Buenos Ayres, 
perhaps inspired to further deeds of prowess by their 
victory over the English, the Argentines resolved to 
throw off the Spanish yoke, and the 25th of May, 1810, 
is celebrated by the Argentines as their independence 
day. Statues in the chief cities commemorate the event ; 
a leading street of Buenos Ayres is named " The 25th of 
May " and when the anniversary arrives the air is rent 



196 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

witli the exploding fire crackers and torpedo, as in our 
country on the 4th of July. 

At first, however, there was little thought of separat- 
ing from Spain, but the Junta of Buenos Ayres resented 
the accession of Joseph Buonaparte to the throne of 
Spain, and proclaimed their allegiance to the claimant, 
Ferdinand VII. But the spirit of rebellion was in the 
air, the power of Spain, distracted by internal troubles 
and under the heel of Napoleon, was broken, and soon 
the revolution was full fledged and the armies of Buenos 
Ayres were marching into the other provinces of Argen- 
tina to arouse the spirit of resistance to Spanish rule. 

At first they were uniformly successful and were 
checked only when their armies reached the high table- 
lands of Bolivia, where the altitude as well as the 
Spanish troops from Peru, fought against them. 

The next fifty years of the history of Argentina is a 
welter of bloodshed and turmoil, but, through it all if 
one can only keep the clue in his hands, ran a great idea 
and a great purpose, often hidden perhaps from the actors 
themselves. This purpose was to establish the balance 
of power between the difierent powerful states of which 
Argentina was composed, and the federal government at 
Buenos Ayres. It was the same conflict which has divided 
the parties of the United States of North America, and 
which in large measure brought on the bloody civil war 
of '61. 

The states' rights party was strong, but the exigencies 
of the situation and the threats of foreign foes, worked in 
favour of the federal party. At last in 1853 a constitu- 
tion based on that of the United States was adopted, and 
this, with a few unimportant amendments remains the 
law of the land, and seems to be thoroughly established 
for all the future. 

We cannot follow the revolutions and counter revolu- 



AEGENTINA 197 

tions, the battles and the bloodshed that stain the pages 
of Argentine history for more than half a century. But 
we should not fail to record the name of her greatest 
hero, General San Martin, — the George Washington of 
South America, who, in the darkest and most critical day 
of the revolutionary movement, took command, and for 
seven years led the armies of the Creole revolutionists to 
victory. 

It would be more appropriate, perhaps, to call General 
San Martin the Ulysses S. Grant of South America, for 
he was as quiet, unassuming and taciturn as the hero of 
Vicksburg and Appomattox. He was never known to 
make but one speech in his life, but he spoke by deeds 
not words, and was as persistent and unyielding as ''Un- 
conditional Surrender Grant" himself. 

In 1812 San Martin landed in Buenos Ayres fresh from 
the Spanish campaign against Napoleon, in which he 
had distinguished himself. At that moment the fortunes 
of the revolutionists throughout all of South America 
were at their lowest ebb. The Spanish arms were suc- 
cessful everywhere except in Argentina and that country 
was distracted by civil war. In Bolivia, Peru and Chile 
the Spaniards had largely regained their lost power, and 
two expeditions of the Argentines into Bolivia had sig- 
nally and disastrously failed. 

Then San Martin began operations at that darkest hour 
for South America which preceded the dawn. Patiently, 
skillfully, he picked and drilled an army of 4,000 men, 
choosing only genuine soldiers who were drilled and 
hardened until they became well-nigh invincible. 

In the meantime, that "fighting demon" of an Irish 
admiral, William Brown, with the few poor ships of Ar- 
gentina, had destroyed the Spanish fleet at Montevideo, 
leaving San Martin free to push his victorious armies to 
the Pacific Coast. Outgeneralling and outmaneuvring 



198 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

the Spanish troops who guarded the mountain passes, 
San Martin led his troops over the Andes at a height far 
above Napoleon's famous conquest of the Alps, surprised 
and captured the city of Santiago, forever broke the 
Spanish power in Chile, built a fleet at Valparaiso, 
wrested Peru from the Spaniards, and virtually freed 
South America from their rule. 

Then, after seven years of drilling and fighting, finding 
that he could not countenance the ambitious personal 
schemes of Bolivar, as has before been explained, he 
retired into voluntary exile, and was almost forgotten 
even by his own countrymen, who have only lately 
awakened to his greatness as a general and a patriot. 
Now streets and towns and many statues in public squares 
do honour to San Martin, the greatest Argentinian, per- 
haps the greatest South American of recorded history. 

The period from 1812 to 1862 is the half century of 
civil war in Argentina, when bloody revolution succeeded 
bloody revolution. Since then political disturbances 
have been comparatively few and of slight moment. The 
"unitarians" who in some respects resemble a states' 
rights party have yielded many of their contentions, and 
Buenos Ayres is established firmly as the federal capital, 
being separated from the state of Buenos Ayres and set 
apart as a federal district, like the District of Columbia. 

During the last quarter of a century wealth has flowed 
into Argentina, and immigration has recruited the cities 
and ranches. It has been the " boom " country of South 
America, and in growth of wealth and population rivals 
any state of North America, keeping pace for instance 
with such commonwealths as Illinois or Ohio, each of 
which states it equals in population and far surpasses in 
territory. 

Of the resources of the country and of the present great- 
ness of Buenos Ayres, other chapters will treat, and it 



AEGENTINA 199 

only remains to be said that great as is the recent growth 
of the republic, and marvellous as her prosperity has 
been, there seem to be but few clouds on her horizon and 
her future promises even greater material glories than her 
past. 



XXIV 

A PROSPEROUS REPUBLIC 

Argentina and Brazil — Tlie Inexhaustible Wealth of Argentina— Her 
Vast Wheat Lands — The Occasional Estancia — The Comparative 
Size of Argentina — The Delta of Great Rivers— The Estuary of the 
La Plata — Nature's Great Excavator— The City of Buenos Ayres 
— Ten Years Ago and Now — The Millionaires of Buenos Ayres. 

THE most prosperous country in South America 
to-day in some respects is the Argentine Ee- 
public. Brazil, to be sure, is pressing Argen- 
tina hard, and on account of her far larger territory, 
population and greater resources, may distance her in 
the race, but the other countries are scarcely in the run- 
ning. Chile, the ancient rival of Argentina, until re- 
cently has been considered her equal in resources and 
military power, but, while Argentina is forging ahead, 
Chile, of late years, has been losing ground, and the 
great earthquake, followed by her recent financial diffi- 
culties, and the depreciation of her currency, is widen- 
ing the gap between the resources of these two repub- 
lics ; though half a 'dozen years of peace and financial 
prosperity for Chile, and a revolution or a few 'locust 
years" for Argentina wheat- fields, might reverse the 
balance. 

The latter contingencies are not likely, however, for the 
federal government of Argentina is growing more and 
more stable, and every year her limitless wheat-fields 
and pasture lands are being extended north and south 
and west. 

Moreover, Argentina is on the right side of the At- 

200 



A PEOSPEEOUS EEPUBLIC 201 

lautic. She is opposite Europe, with which she has al- 
most daily commuuication by steamer. She can reach 
the capital of Brazil in four days ; New York in three 
weeks, while the shabby steamers that crawl up the west 
coast of South America take twenty-six days to reach 
Panama, and nearly twice as long to reach San Fran- 
cisco. 

The traveller gets a tremendous impression of the 
mighty resources of Argentina in crossing from the 
Andes to the coast. The journey from Mendoza to 
Buenos Ayres is about seven hundred miles in length, 
and takes a night and a day on a fast train. 

Except for one low range of mountains near the 
western side, one rides over an absolutely flat plain. 
Not a hillock as big as a good-sized ant-hill is in sight ; 
not a mile of rolling prairie ; not a barn, scarcely a 
house besides an occasional mud hut with a straw roof. 
A very few villages break the monotony of the view for 
hundreds of miles. 

Great haystacks for miles and miles, and herds of 
countless cattle are the only outstanding objects on the 
horizon. And yet this is one of the richest countries of 
the world. Here lies the exhaustless wealth of Argen- 
tina, for these prairies sustain millions of cattle and 
hundreds of millions of sheep, and out of this mellow 
and prolific soil will grow wheat and corn enough to feed 
half the world. 

What one can see from the transcontinental railway is 
only a little ribbon of land, a few miles wide, on either 
side of the track, while for hundreds of miles, north and 
south and east and west, extend these vast fertile plains 
without a mile of desert to mar the scene. The available 
wheat land of Argentina is estimated at 240,000,000 of 
acres, though not ten per cent, of this is yet under cul- 
tivation. 



202 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

With all its actual wealth, Argentina is still largely a 
country of possibilities. As compared with our own 
prairie states of Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska, its develop- 
ment has but just begun. There you see not only vast 
fields of corn and wheat, but thousands of comfortable 
farmhouses, tree shaded villas, thriving towns with 
churches, schools and court-houses. 

Here you strain your aching, dust-filled eyes to get a 
glimpse of anything besides herds of cattle and flocks of 
sheep. Away off in the distance, after gazing through 
the window of the flying train for half an hour, perhaps, 
you see a single house that is worthy of the name, sur- 
rounded by trees and gardens. In the same distance you 
would see a hundred such homes in Iowa and Kansas. 
This solitary house is on an estancia or gigantic farm, 
occupied for a few weeks of the year by the wealthy 
owner who lives for the rest of the twelve months in 
some palace of Buenos Ayres. 

Scattered here and there over the prairie are some 
wretched mud huts where the actual tiUers of the soil 
live. These are usually Italian peasants, who earn $30 
or $35 a month in addition to all the meat (mutton) they 
want to eat, and who often, between harvests, go back to 
sunny Italy to spend what they have earned, and then to 
return again before the next harvest time. 

Many of these estancias contain 10,000, 20,000, even 
50,000 acres, and not a few proprietors have estates that 
run up into the hundreds of thousands. Probably there 
is no country in the world where wealth is accumulated 
in the hands of a few as in Argentina. Considering the 
whole wealth of the country, our multi-millionaires are 
poor men proportionally, compared with the magnates 
of Argentina. One cannot regard this as a healthy state 
of affairs, but, doubtless, as the population increases, 
wealth and land will be more evenly distributed, and the 



A PEOSPEEOUS EEPUBLIC 203 

cultivators of the soil will own it instead of slaving for 
the lords of the land. 

In comparing the size of Argentina with other coun- 
tries, Mr. F. G. Carpenter says : " K we could lift it 
up at the corners, turn it around and spread it upon 
the United States from east to west, placing the edge of 
Patagonia at New York, the borders of Brazil and 
Bolivia, which bound Argentina on the north, would be 
some distance beyond Salt Lake City. If we could cut 
Argentina up into patchwork pieces and fit them upon 
our territory, every inch of land east of the Mississippi 
would be covered, and the remnants would be larger 
than the area of several states west of that river. The 
Argentine Eepublic is twelve times as large as Great 
Britian. It is five times the size of France, and it is 
greater in area than the states of Mississippi, Louisiana, 
Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, Utah, Colorado 
and Kansas combined." 

But the real size of a country cannot be measured by 
the number of square miles over which its flag flies, but 
rather by the amount of its productive territory and the 
population it can sustain. Measured by this test, tod, 
Argentina is a great country, for the proportion of its 
unproductive territory is very small. To be sure, there 
are vast, bleak, wind-swept areas in southern Patagonia, 
but even there soEje of the best sheep in the world can be 
raised. In the west, Argentina' s territory sweeps up to the 
crest of the Andes, but the slope is steep, and we soon get 
down from the "cumbra," the summit, to the fertile 
plains of Mendoza, where the best grapes and the most 
delicious fruits grow. Then, as we have seen, from there 
to the sea, stretch the vast reaches of productive soil that 
only need the water which almost everywhere underlies the 
plains, and a little tickling with the hoe, to produce the 
broad smile of an abundant harvest. 



204 THE COKTD^ENT OF OPPOETUiflTY 

All this land is really the vast delta of a series of great 
rivers which have brought the silt down from the Andes 
in the countless ages of the past, and have been pushing 
the rich soil farther and farther out into the Atlantic 
ocean and forming the pastures on which the flocks and 
herds of the world can graze. This process is still going 
on, and for miles and miles the ocean beyond the wide 
mouth of the Eiver Plate is stained a deep coffee colour 
by the soil brought down by the great rivers, the Uru- 
guay, the Paraguay, and Parana. These rivers unite 
one hundred and eighty miles from the sea to form the 
Eio de la Plata, or the Eiver Plate, as it is uneuphoni- 
ously called in English. 

What the Eiver Plate lacks in length (though the trib- 
utaries that form it make it one of the longest in the 
world) it makes up in width, for it is one hundred and 
twenty miles wide at the mouth. We boarded the steamer 
which was to ferry us across the mouth of this river, at 
six o'clock in the evening, and it was early the next 
morning before we reached Montevideo, on the other 
side. So wide indeed is this vast estuary that one might 
to all appearances be on the broad ocean, for from the 
middle no land is visible on either side, and frequently 
rough weather with its accompanying seasickness leads 
one to think that he is a thousand miles at sea, instead of 
in a fresh water river. 

To quote from Carpenter again : "The La Plata is so 
full of silt that it drops 10,000 tons of mud every hour. 
This is a mass so great that were it loaded upon two-horse 
wagons it would take a line of teams sixty miles long to 
carry it ; it would require a solid line of such teams reaching 
from New York to Omaha to carry the dropping of one day." 

Such is one of nature's greatest excavators and builders. 
If our government could turn such an excavator upon the 
Isthmus of Panama how quickly the canal would be dug, 



A PEOSPEROUS EEPUBLIG 205 

provided only it had to deal with the soft and friable 
material of which the seacoast of Argentina is built ! 

But such an excavator has its disadvantages, for it 
dumps its material in very inconvenient places, at the 
entrance to the harbour of Montevideo, for instance, and 
in the channel of the river, so that constant dredging is 
required, and a jetty system like that at the mouth of the 
Mississippi is contemplated. 

To speak of Argentina without mentioning Buenos 
Ayres is to describe France without alluding to Paris. 
In fact, Buenos Ayres is far more to Argentina than Paris 
is to France, or Berlin to Prussia, or New York City to 
Hew York State. It not only contains more than a fifth 
of the population, but far more than a fifth of the wealth 
and culture. Indeed, representatives of nearly all the 
leading families of the country settle here to spend their 
money, wherever they may make it. 

Except the Australian states of New South Wales and 
Victoria, no countries contain so large a proportion of 
urban population as Argentina. Buenos Ayres is indeed 
a surprising city, when one thinks of the time it has had 
to grow. Though founded centuries ago, the modern 
Buenos Ayres is younger than Chicago. It is the boom 
town of the southern continent, quite as emphatically as 
the metropolis on Lake Michigan stands for the record 
growth of a North American city. 

One expects much before he reaches Buenos Ayres, for 
he has read of its marvels, and travellers' twice-told tales 
have prepared him for a great, prosperous, busy city. 
But when he gets there, he is inclined to exclaim with the 
Queen of Sheba, "the half has not been told." 

Yet very largely this modern Buenos Ayres has been 
built up within the last fifteen years. Ten years ago 
horse cars plodded through the streets and the drivers 
blew their cow horns at every cross street to warn passers- 



206 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

by that they were coining. Now swift electric cars clang 
their bells as they go rushing through the narrow streets 
at a rate which one would think would make them twice 
as fatal as the Juggernauts of Serampore. Fifteen years 
ago most of the streets were paved with cobble stones, and 
horribly paved at that. Now all the principal streets 
are paved with asphalt and the automobiles and rubber- 
tired carriages, drawn by splendid horses, roll as smoothly 
over them as over the boulevards of Paris. 

Huge buildings are going up everywhere ; great busi* 
ness blocks of six or eight stories, and covering an im- 
mense ground space (for sky-scrapers are not yet allowed). 
It is said that 30,000 houses will be built this year (1907), 
yet it is almost impossible to secure a house, and then 
only at a tremendous rental. 

Beauty has not been ignored in the architecture of the 
city, though it must be confessed that the old Spanish 
style which still prevails, of a low building of one or two 
stories, built around an inner court-yard, or patio, does 
not lend itself to imposing structures, however pleasant 
the interior of the house with its flower-decked patio, 
may be. In many cases, however, in the leading streets, 
the architects have broken away from the old traditions, 
and most of the modern buildings would do credit to any 
city of the world. 

The Plaza de Mayo, for instance, would be hard to 
match for the beauty of its surrounding buildings in any 
city of the North American continent, and the avenue of 
the same name, which leads out of it, is finer than the 
famous Unter den Linden of Berlin. 

More millionaires live in Buenos Ayres than in any 
other city of the world of its size, if that is an enviable 
distinction, and from the prices charged for everything, 
from a house lot to a shoestring, one would seem to need 
to be a millionaire to live there for any length of time. 



A PEOSPEEOUS EEPUBLIO 207 

The leading English daily of Buenos Ayres, for this 
cosmopolitan city supports daily newspapers in all the 
great modern languages, thus summarized the condition 
of the Eepublic at the beginning of 1907 : 

" The new year begins under the happiest auspices for 
the Argentine Eepublic. It is at peace with all nations 
and complete order prevails throughout the whole extent 
of its vast territory. The harvest bids fair to be the 
most abundant ever known ; the seasons were propitious 
for the pasture lands for cattle and sheep, and the high 
prices which are being realized for wool makes the hearts 
of ' estancieros ' rejoice. A spontaneous current of im- 
migration supplies the labour needed by the development 
of agriculture (the result of the rapidly increasing di- 
vision of large landed estates), for the construction of rail- 
ways, tramways, ports, and other public works, which 
are in course of construction, and for the exploitation of 
forests and rivers. . . . The idea of making great 
additions to the navy appears to have been abandoned 
for the present and it may be hoped that an understand- 
ing with Brazil will render unnecessary a rivalry with 
that power in the acquisition of armaments. . . . 
The balance of trade has again turned in favour of this 
country, and consequently the stock of gold in the Con- 
version Office is constantly increasing." 

This brief review of a recent year's history fairly sum- 
marizes the present political, industrial and commercial 
condition of this Eepublic of the far South. 

To be sure, a little revolution in the province of San 
Juan has since broken out, but it is a local affair, and in 
no way affects the stability of the federal government 
of Buenos Ayres. For years to come, so far as human 
foresight can forecast the future, the prosperity of Ar- 
gentina seems assured. 



XXV 

PECULIARITIES OF BUENOS AYRES 

The Largest City in South America— The Many Nationalities— Few 
Americans — An Air of Prosperity — High Prices, Enormous Bents — 
The Conventilla — Beautiful Patios — " La Prensa " — Around the Plaza 
de Mayo — President Alcorta. 

AT the first glaiice you would think that Buenos 
Ayres had no peculiarities. It looks very much 
like any other fine and large city with its busy 
streets, its clanging street-cars, its tree-shaded avenues, 
its bustling stores and beautiful churches and public build- 
ings. But, if these were all there was to write about, it 
would scarcely be worth a chapter. 

If Paris were just like London, and London like New 
York, and New York like Buenos Ayres, one description 
would fit them all. It is the peculiarities of each that 
make them interesting, and, however much big cities 
look alike at first glance, it is not difficult to find beneath 
the surface their distinct characteristics. 

Bueuos Ayres, then, ''the city of good air" may 
rightly claim several superlatives, and is worthy of more 
special description than could be accorded to it in the 
last chapter. 

It is the largest city in South America, the largest but 
three in all America, and second largest Eoman Catholic 
city in the world, the largest Spanish -speaking city in 
the world, the largest city but one of the Latin races. 

It may be added that it is the most cosmopolitan city 
in the world, though in this respect New York and 
Chicago would press it hard. Walk along Calle Florida 

208 



PECULIAEITIES OF BUENOS AYEES 209 

or the Avenue de Mayo, and count the languages you 
hear in half an hour ! Spanish would predominate, to 
be sure; but you would hear almost as much Italian 
spoken, and English (probably cockney English) you 
would be quite sure to hear. That deep, strong guttural 
yoti recognize, as you draw near, as German. That man 
looking into the shop window and speaking about the 
high prices marked on the goods is a Swede, and that 
black-eyed couple talking so fast and so musically are 
Portuguese. A man, whose decidedly Scotch burr you 
hear as we pass him, is surely from " Glaskie," and the 
next man, who talks with his fingers and his shoulders as 
well as his mouth, is from la belle France. 

Almost the only man you will not be likely to see in a 
short walk is the American, and even he is becoming 
every year more numerous. A better class of Americans 
is coming into the country ; and the "American church," 
three-fourths of whose members are English or Scotch, is 
doing its full share as a religious and social organization 
to rehabilitate the good name of America, which suf- 
fered so much before the days of the extradition treaty. 

Another characteristic of Buenos Ayres is its air of 
prosperity. This perhaps is the good air that its name 
signifies. You are tempted to think it is a city of 
millionaires at first. Magnificent turn-outs dash past you 
on the principal streets. Blooded horses are hitched to 
luxurious carriages or sixty-horse power automobiles even 
more luxurious than the carriages sound their fog-horns at 
every corner. 

Men and women and lap-dogs, all dressed in the height 
of fashion, loll in the carriages. As stated in a previous 
chapter, more multi-millionaires abound in Buenos Ayres 
than in any city of the world, I suppose, for every one 
who has made any money in any part of the Argentine 
Eepublic comes to Buenos Ayres to spend it. The vast 



210 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

*' estancias" or farms of from ten to one hundred thou- 
sand acres, owned largely by Buenos Ayres nabobs, pour 
the wealth of their wheat-fields and cattle-ranches and 
sheepfolds into Buenos Ayres from all the territory 
within a thousand miles. 

As the passer-by gazes in at the shop-windows, he often 
wonders how any one but a millionaire can live here. 
An ordinary derby hat (you could buy it at home for two 
dollars and a half j costs twelve dollars here, while nine- 
teen or twenty dollars is not an unusual price. Collars 
are two dollars and a half for half a dozen. A lawn 
necktie, such as I should buy for ten cents at home, or 
perhaps five, the dealer unblushingly said was seventy - 
five cents, and kindly told me I could have three for two 
dollars. Three-dollar-and-a-half boots cost nineteen 
dollars, and a good suit of clothes two hundred dollars. 

To be sure Argentine money is worth less than half of 
ours, and so these prices must be divided by two to find 
the cost in gold ; but even then they are beyond all rea- 
son, even making allowances for high duties, cost of trans- 
portation, etc. 

It is in the matter of rent that the prices bear the 
hardest on people in moderate circumstances. Cheap 
single rooms are advertised in the papers for rent at two 
and three dollars a day, and suites of six rooms in an un- 
fashionable part of the city cost $150 to $200 a month, 
while small homes in fashionable quarters are hard to 
get at a thousand dollars a month. In the large hotels 
twelve dollars a day is the minimum rate, and from that 
the prices mount to fifty dollars a day. 

How then do poor people live, for it can hardly be 
supposed that all Buenos Ayreans are millionaires? 
Come with me to a '' conventilla" and I will show you 
how the poor people exist. We enter a door which opens 
directly upon the sidewalk, a door which may be the 



PECULIAEITIES OF BUENOS AYEES 211 

very next neighbour to a millionaire's magnificent palace. 
Inside this door you see a court-yard, and around the 
court a multitude of smaller doors. Perhaps there are 
two stories, and in the second story the doors open into 
a balcony over the court-yard. Each of these doors leads 
to a single room, and in this room lives a whole family, 
father, mother, children, and perhaps sons-in-law and 
grandchildren. Five or six sleep in the same bed, and 
the cooking is done over a charcoal brazier in the court- 
yard. 

Several hundred people may live and move and have 
their being in a single two-story *' conventilla" and this 
solves the problem of existence (it is hard to call it liv- 
ing) for the very poor ; for provisions are not abnormally 
high, and old clothes do not cost much in any country. 
The severest pinch comes to those with a fixed salary, 
and not an extravagant one, who wish to live in decent 
seclusion with a room, we will suppose, for each member, 
or at least for every two members, of the family. 

K one can afford it, however, there are few more de- 
lightful places in the world to live in than Buenos Ayres. 
In spite of a rather high death rate, in spring and 
autumn the weather is delightful. I have seldom seen 
two such glorious weeks of perfect weather as the two 
I have just spent there. The homes of the well-to-do 
have a beautiful "patio" or miniature garden in the 
middle, into which all the rooms open, so that they can 
enjoy fresh air and privacy at the same time. 

Churches, clubs, newspapers in all languages, and a 
cosmopolitan society where birds of a feather flock to- 
gether according to their tastes and proclivities, give 
each one the social and intellectual and spiritual life 
which he desires. 

The prevailing style of architecture, where so many of 
the houses are of only one story, is apt to be flat and 



212 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

rather monotonous, but there are enough large and fine 
buildings to relieve the monotony. The reservoir, for 
instance, in the heart of the city is a magnificent build- 
ing costing millions, and covered with beautiful glazed 
tiles of various colours and designs. Some of the school- 
houses would do credit to Boston or Chicago, while La 
Frensa, the leading daily paper, has the finest newspaper 
office in the world. From the top of the magnificent 
edifice a winged Mercury seems about to run with the 
news of the day to every house in the city. 

When news of any special importance is received, a 
siren from the top of this building gives a frightful shriek. 
If a cablegram of great good news arrives at night, a big 
white light flashes out over the great city. If it is bad 
news, like the San Francisco earthquake, for instance, an 
ominous lurid red flash that can be seen for miles an- 
nounces it. Within the palatial building are reception 
rooms that surpass in splendour the audience-rooms in 
many a king's palace. Free medical advice is given daily 
to all who apply for it at the doors of La Frensa, and free 
legal advice also, and scores avail themselves of this boon 
every day. By far the greatest Spanish newspaper in 
the world, this must be ranked among the most influential 
in any language. 

Around the great square called the Plaza de Mayo, 
which celebrates the independence of Argentina, May 25, 
1810 (Argentina's Fourth of July) are several notable 
buildings, — a great cathedral modelled after the church 
of the Madeleine in Paris, one of the largest banks in 
the world, the stock exchange where speculation runs 
riot even more than in Wall Street, and the Palace 
of the President, which also contains the government 
offices. 

Buenos Ayres has many points of interest which the 
limits of this volume do not allow me to point out. It is 



PECULIAEITIES OF BUENOS AYEES 213 

safe to say that however much one has travelled if he 
has not seen the great city on the Plate he has missed 
one of the most beautiful and fascinating cities in all the 
world. 



XXVI 

URUGUAY AND URUGUAYANS 

"I Bee a Mountain "—Tragedy and Comedy in Montevideo— Rapid Be- 
cuperation— A Revolution Every Two Years — " Tlie Landing of the 
Thirty-Three " — The Blancos and the Colorados— " Insulting " the 
President — A Substantial City — The Liebig Extract Company — A 
Brighter Future. 

AS one sails down the great muddy estuary called 
the Eiv<^r Plate, he sees, near the place where it 
debouches into the Atlantic Ocean, a small rise 
of ground which almost anywhere else would escape ob- 
servation. Here, however, with perfectly flat shores all 
about and prairies extending back for hundreds of miles, 
the one solitary hill assumes an impressiveness out of all 
proportion to its size. The eye has been so long accus- 
tomed to monotonous levels that it hails Cerrito as an 
Alpine wonder. Some old prints represent it as a veri- 
table Mont Blanc, dominating the little city that nestles 
at its base. 

It evidently appealed to the imagination of Ferdinand 
Magellan, as he sailed by this coast on his great and 
momentous voyage around the world, for he cried out : 
"I see a mountain," — Montevideo. This was on the 
15th of January, 1520, and since then every one who has 
pronounced the name of the capital of Uruguay has said 
the same, " I see a mountain," for that of course is what 
the name means. 

Around this famous hill history has been busy ever 
since, for Montevideo is Uruguay in a more emphatic way 
than Paris is France or Buenos Ayres is the Argentine. 

In reading the story of Uruguayan history one is in 
214 



UEUGUAY AND UEUGUAYANS 215 

doubt whether it savours more of comedy or tragedy, 
the questions at issue often seem so trivial, the results of 
the conflict so bloody and the stage so small as compared 
with the world's larger conflicts. 

The tragic element prevails, however, for the causes 
of the innumerable wars were very real and very im- 
portant to the people who took part in them, since men 
do not bleed and die for what they regard as of no con- 
sequence. 

Another wonderful thing that strikes the student of 
Uruguayan history is the rapid recupieration of the coun- 
try after the most disastrous foreign and civil wars. One 
year we read of the country pillaged, t^^e city of Mon- 
tevideo bombarded and sacked, thousands of the able 
bodied men killed in war, and other thousands self- 
exiled because of the defeat of their party. The next 
year we read of a great increase in population, wealth 
and governmental revenues, and of unlimited borrowing 
for internal improvements. 

The fact is that Uruguay, in spite of her limited terri- 
tory and population, is so rich in available resources, 
chiefly cattle and sheep, and has such a commanding and 
strategic situation on the Atlantic coast that she cannot 
be kept down either by her own foolish fights or by for- 
eign foes. She is said to have averaged a revolution 
every two years for three-quarters of a century, and yet, 
though each revolution sets her back a twelvemonth or 
so, in the remaining peaceful twelvemonth she regains 
the population and wealth she lost and distinctly forges 
ahead. 

For a long time her history was wrapped up with that 
of her powerful neighbours, Brazil on the north and Ar- 
gentina on the south. She was embroiled in all their 
wars, as well as her own, and was alternately ruled by 
one or the other. 



216 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUKITY 

General Don Jos6 Gervasio Artigas is considered the 
founder of the Uruguayan nation, though he was never 
chosen to office by the people and was disastrously de- 
feated and driven into exile by the Brazilians ; an exile 
in which he spent the last thirty years of his life. He 
was little more than a guerilla chief, "who for twenty- 
five years kept the soil of Uruguay and of the Argentine 
Mesopotamia soaked in blood." But he awakened na- 
tional aspirations in the hearts of the people, and for this 
reason he has been canonized as a national hero, and his 
body buried in state in Montevideo. 

It was my fortune to be in Montevideo on the 19th of 
April, an anniversary day familiar to a Massachusetts 
man, when I found the banks and shops closed, and the 
city wearing a general holiday air. It could not be, I 
thought, that six thousand miles away they were cele- 
brating the Concord fight and the battle of Lexington, 
and I was soon informed that it was the anniversary of 
the " Landing of the Thirty-three " ; a day as religiously 
observed in Uruguay as the anniversary of the landing 
of the Pilgrims in New England. 

And who were the famous Thirty-three? Merely a 
band of adventurers who, on the 19th of April, 1825, 
landed on the shores of a river in the southwestern cor- 
ner of the country. Uruguay was then under the domina- 
tion of Brazil, and the people in town and country were 
restive under her sway. The famous Thirty-three soon 
rallied to their standard practically all the people. Even 
the soldiers who were in the pay of the Brazilian govern- 
ment refused to fight their compatriots, their officers de- 
serted to the enemy, and soon, in spite of desperate efforts 
on the part of Brazil, Uruguay was free and independent. 

Argentina favoured her cause ; the intrepid Irish ad- 
miral, William Brown, battered the Brazilian fleet at sea, 
and in 1828 Brazil as well as Argentina, gave up their 



UEUGUAY A^B UEUGUAYANS 217 

claims to Uruguay and guaranteed her independence for 
five years. 

But tlie distracted little country was not to enjoy a pro- 
longed peace, for in 1832 a civil war broke out, which 
with certain periodic breathing spells, may be considered 
to have lasted ever since. At least the revolutions have 
been so numerous that they cannot be individually re- 
corded in a short chapter of history, and few of these 
revolutions have been altogether bloodless. 

During the later years of the nineteenth century, how- 
ever, they lost much of their ferocious character, and 
were little more than political overturnings, when the 
outs struggled to get in, and the ins fought to stay in. 
The "Blancos," the aristocratic conservative party, was 
always opposed by the "Colorados," the democratic 
liberal party recruited largely from the common people 
and the cowboys of the plains, and in the end the Blancos 
were defeated and liberal ideas prevailed. 

In spite of these disturbances, political, martial and 
commercial, the country grew in wealth and population, 
and improved every breathing spell from war to take an 
advance step in prosperity. By 1890 the immigration to 
Uruguay had run up to 20,000 a year, and the popula- 
tion had increased to 700,000, a gain of more than 100 
per cent, in twelve years. In 1897 President Borda was 
assassinated in the streets of Montevideo, while marching 
at the head of a religious procession. A grocer's clerk 
was seen to walk deliberately up to him, press a pistol 
against his white shirt-front and fire point blank. Of 
course the president fell, and he was buried without a 
post mortem examination. When the grocer's clerk, who 
was arrested red-handed, came to be tried for his life, his 
lawyer pleaded that, according to Uruguayan law, a post 
mortem examination was necessary to prove whether the 
president died from fright, heart disease or a pistol shot, 



218 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

so his client could not be convicted. The jury, strange 
to say, took the lawyer's view of the case, and condemned 
the assassin to two years' imprisonment for ''insulting 
the president " ; — an insult with a vengeance, indeed ! A 
Philadelphia lawyer could not have made a more ingeni- 
ous plea, or one of our own Tammany juries executed a 
worse travesty on Justice. 

Montevideo strikes the tourist, fresh from the stir and 
bustle of mighty Buenos Ayres, as rather a sleepy old 
town and as somewhat commonplace if he comes from the 
north, with the glories of beautiful Eio in his eyes. But 
its inhabitants are never tired of praising it for its situa- 
tion, its climate and its sedate business ways, which, I 
have been assured more than once, are far superior to the 
greed for the almighty dollar evinced in Buenos Ayres 
and Eio, and preeminently in the United States. 

The city has a substantial, old-world appearance, and 
when the new electric street cars supplant all the old 
mule cars, as they very likely will do before this book is 
printed, one great want of easy communication will be 
supplied. There are some fine residences in the outskirts 
of the city, with beautiful gardens in which every sub- 
tropical plant will grow, and the sea which surrounds 
the city on every side but one, brings salubrious breezes 
and bathing privileges to all ; a boon which the Buenos 
Ayreans appreciate, for they flock hither in large num- 
bers every summer for their health. Large steamers, 
compared by one over-partial writer to the Fall Eiver 
boats between Boston and New York, join the two cities 
with a nightly service, and the connection between these 
great cities of the south both socially and commercially 
is very close. 

The great wealth of Uruguay, outside of Montevideo, as 
a business and distributing centre, is found in her flocks 
and herds which dot her fertile plains. Here is a country 



UETJGUAY AND UEUGUAYANS 219 

which, though it is the smallest in South America, is yet 
as large as England, and is practically one vast pasture. 
Every part of it is easily accessible. There are no lofty 
mountains and few impassable jungles, but it is a country 
of rich, luscious grasses, where fat cattle and sheep thrive 
by the million. One company alone, the famous Liebig 
Extract Company, which manufactures beef tea for the 
world, owns 1,200,000 acres in Uruguay, Argentina and 
Paraguay, but largely in the former country. On its 
enormous ranches are 200,000 horned cattle and 60,000 
sheep, and over six million head of cattle have passed 
through its hands in the fifty years of its existence. 

Twenty-five hundred workmen are employed in this 
business, and |17,500,000 have been distributed in divi- 
dends. These enormous figures show on what a large 
scale business is sometimes conducted even in a little re- 
public. 

The future of Uruguay will doubtless be less stormy 
than the past, — it could hardly be more so. Those who 
are best informed assure me that there are signs of polit- 
ical stability that have never been seen before, and 
though there may be periodic revolutions in the years to 
come, they are not likely to be accompanied by bloody 
civil wars, or greatly to upset the course of business and 
social life. 

The currency of Uruguay is on a more stable basis 
than that of most of her South American sisters, and a 
paper dollar is worth a dollar in gold, the only republic 
south of the Mexican line of which this is true. Prices 
of living, especially of rents, is high as in all the coun- 
tries of the Atlantic coast of South America, and second 
rate hotels charge first-class New York prices. But if 
money goes easily, it comes easily, too, and foreign mer- 
chants have no reason to complain of the state of trade. 
Indeed, among those I met in Montevideo, some seemed 



220 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

to develop an unusual love for their adopted land, and a 
tendency to depreciate every other in comparison with, 
it. One sign of a country with a future is this faculty 
of inspiring the patriotism of adopted citizens, a trait in 
which our own country so preeminently excels. 

Little Uruguay has certainly had her baptism of 
blood, and if she is not absorbed by her stronger neigh- 
bours on either side, she will doubtless have an increas- 
ingly prosperous career, and Montevideo will always di- 
vide with her great rival, Buenos Ayres, the tremendous 
commerce of the Plate. 



XXVII 

PARAGUAY, THE ISOLATED 

The Little Benjamin— An Ancient Country— Tlie Jesuits in Paraguay— 
The Strange Reign of Dr. Francia— " El Supremo " and ' El De- 
funto " — Lopez, the Unscrupulous Tyrant — A Terrible War — Yerba 
Mate— The Future of Paraguay. 

PAEAGTJAY is the little Benjamin among the re- 
publics of South America, and, aside from 
Panama, there are few tinier nations which main- 
tain the paraphernalia of government. About the size 
of the state of Illinois in area, Paraguay has a 
population less than greater Boston and about the same 
as Glasgow, two-thirds of whom are women and nine- 
tenths of whom are Indians or people with a large ad- 
mixture of Indian blood. 

It is one of the most isolated of nations, occupying its 
unique position in the very heart of the continent as a buf- 
fer state between Brazil and Argentina, and removed from 
the seacoast by a week's journey on a small steamer up a 
tortuous river. Yet, in spite of her small size and her 
isolation, her history is most interesting, and gives an 
example of more experiments in government than many 
a larger and more important state. 

It is an ancient country, too, and the first families can 
boast of having "come over" before the Mayflower. 
Its capital and chief city, Ascuncion, was founded just a 
hundred years before the capital of Massachusetts, but 
circumstances and devastating wars have prevented its 
growth, and it is still a large country village, great in 
the eyes of the Paraguayans, but overtopped in popula- 

221 



222 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

tion by a thousand inconspicuous towns in Europe and 
America. 

In fertility and natural agricultural wealth, few coun- 
tries, however, can outrank Paraguay, and the fact that 
she has maintained her independence during all these 
years when surrounded by greater and richer neighbours, 
certainly speaks well for the patriotism and prowess of 
her people. 

The earliest history of Paraguay is uneventful. She 
seems to have felt but lightly the Spanish yoke, which 
perhaps was hardly thought worth imposing. To be 
sure, there was in the early days a nominal Spanish gov- 
ernor at Ascuncion, but the larger part of Paraguay was 
under the control of the Jesuit priests who protected 
while they half enslaved the Indians, rendering them 
entirely obedient to their commands. 

It must be said for the Jesuits, however, that they 
treated the Indians far better than any of the other white 
settlers. They had some regard for their evangelization j 
they introduced some of the arts of civilization ; they im- 
proved the agriculture of the Indians, and increased 
their wealth, and at great personal sacrifice and risk on 
their own part, pushed their discoveries far up into the 
interior of South America, where, even to-day, white men 
hesitate to go. They seem, too, to have ingrained into 
the Guarany character habits of implicit and unquestion- 
ing obedience, which served well the later tyrants and 
despots of Paraguay, who were able in the bloody 
wars that have marked the early part of the last half 
century to lead their troops to death or victory. 

But the Brazilians on the north and the Creoles of 
Ascuncion alike hated the Jesuits, and feared their in- 
creasing control over the docile Indians, and, between 
the two, the Jesuits fared badly, first being driven out 
of their hard- won possessions in the north and then, a 



PARAGUAY, THE ISOLATED 223 

century later, being expelled from tlie fertile lands in the 
south, to which they had fled from the Paulistas, the 
warlike settlers of the Sao Paulo province of Brazil. 

The interesting period of Paraguay's history began with 
the eighteenth century when they shared to some extent 
the intellectual and political ferment of the rest of South 
America. In Paraguay, however, there was little desire 
for real republican institutions. The people had been 
trained too long and too well in obedience to priests and 
the powers that be, to care for even the semblance of 
power, that was demanded in other countries, and they 
only waited for a strong and determined man to take 
control and guide the affairs of their little state. 

The man and the opportunity met, and the man was 
Dr. Francia, one of the strangest, strongest characters 
who ever wrote his name on the page of history. Carlyle 
has numbered him among his heroes, and if a hero is 
simply a man who breaks away all opposition and rides 
over and tramples down all his opponents, Francia was 
certainly a hero. The Beatitudes, however, were far from 
his ideals, and the peace he imposed on his countrymen 
was the peace of death, fear and stagnation. Francia, 
however, had his good points. As a lawyer he had un- 
dertaken the cause of the poor against the rich. He al- 
ways seemed to try to execute justice in his own high 
handed, tyrannical way, and, though he imprisoned and 
killed friend and foe alike when it suited his purpose, he 
never lost the confidence and goodwill of the Indians 
with whom he invariably sided against the Spaniards 
and Creoles. 

In 1815 this remarkable man was chosen one of the 
two consuls of Paraguay. The other consul, an ignorant 
soldier, he soon pushed out of his ambitious way, and 
from that day until the hour of his death in 1848 at the 
age of eighty-three, he reigned alone and unchallenged, 



224 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

a more absolute monarch in his small domain than ever 
sat upon the throne of Eussia. He had himself formally- 
declared ''Supreme and Perpetual Dictator," and as- 
sumed the title of "El Supremo." 

His strange power has thus been graphically described : 
"As he grew older he became more solitary and fero- 
cious. . . . His severities against the educated 
classes increased. He suffered from frequent attacks of 
hypochondria. He ordered wholesale executions, and 
when he died 700 political prisoners filled the jails. His 
moroseness increased year by year. He feared assassina- 
tion and occupied several houses, letting no one know 
where he was going to sleep from one night to another, 
and when walking the streets kept his guards at a dis- 
tance before and behind. Woe to the enemy or suspect 
that attracted his attention ! Such was the terror in- 
spired by the dreadful old man that the news that he was 
out would clear the streets. A white Paraguayan dared 
not utter his name. During his lifetime he was "El 
Supremo," and after he was dead for generations he was 
referred to simply as "El Defunto." For years when 
men spoke of him they looked behind them and crossed 
themselves as if dreading that the mighty old man could 
send devils to spy upon them, — at least this is the story 
of Francia's enemies, who have made it their business to 
hand his name down to execration." ' 

During the twenty-six years of Francia's dictatorship 
he absolutely forbade all external commerce. Not a ship 
could sail up or down the great Paraguay River without 
his permission, a permission rarely granted. Paraguay 
became a self-sufficing state, raising its own food, carding 
its own wool, building its own houses, neither sending 
nor receiving ministers or consuls ; it was more isolated 

^Dawson's "South American Republics." 



PAEAGUAY, THE ISOLATED 225 



than China or Corea when their barriers against the out- 
side world were the highest. 

Though of course there was little progress under 
such conditions, there was doubtless little physical 
suffering. Oranges, bananas and other fruits of the earth 
grow spontaneously in that mild climate and fruitful 
soil ; and though there was little money in circulation 
there was little need of it. A fat bullock it is said, 
could be bought for a dollar, and most men did not need 
even the doUar, for they raised their own bullock. 

But such a state of affairs must come to an end. It 
was foreign to the spirit of the nineteenth century, and 
when stern old Francia died he was succeeded by a 
tyrant, to be sure, but by a more moderate tyrant, the 
elder Lopez, who reversed the policy of his predecessor, 
opened his ports to commerce, and even encouraged the 
coming of foreigners until he found that he could not 
welcome other foreigners and exclude Brazilians whom 
he regarded as his mortal foes. 

At first Americans were in high favour and received 
some concessions, but soon they fell into disrepute with 
Lopez, who drove them and all other foreigners from his 
domains. 

Lopez was succeeded in the dictatorship by his son, 
Francisco Lopez, as corrupt and unscrupulous a tyrant 
as ever seized the reins of power. He managed to em- 
broil himself with Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay at the 
same time, and one of the bloodiest and most protracted 
wars of modern history ensued. 

It seems strange that these adjectives can be applied to 
a, war waged by a little country with the population of a 
moderate modern city scattered over the wilds of South 
America; but when we remember that this war was 
waged relentlessly from 1864 to 1870, and that in this 
time " no less than two hundred and twenty-five thousand 



226 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

Paraguayan men — the fathers and breadwinners, the 
farmers and labourers, — had perished in battle, by dis- 
ease or exposure or starvation, and that one hundred 
thousand adult women had died of hardships and hunger," 
we see that this description of the war is not overdrawn. 
The proportion of the dead to the living at the close of 
the war, was appalling, for, we are told, that out of two 
hundred and fifty thousand able-bodied men who were 
living in 1864, less than twenty-five thousand survived in 
1870. Had twenty millions of men perished on both 
sides in the American civil war, the proportion of slain 
would not have been greater than of the Paraguayans 
who gave up their lives at the behest of a miserable tyrant 
in that awful half decade which followed our own civil 
war. At the end of the Paraguayan war, the women out- 
numbered the men five to one, and there were only 90,000 
children left in the country. The allies of Brazil, Argen- 
tina and Uruguay suffered great losses in men and treas- 
ure, but compared with their resources, their losses were 
slight. 

Since 1870, happily, the history of Paraguay has been 
uneventful, and she has been gradually recuperating 
her resources and growing a new crop of men and 
women. 

Eegular weekly communication is kept up with Buenos 
Ayres by two lines of fairly comfortable steamers, and 
the commerce of the country is already considerable, 
consisting of hides, wool, precious woods, and yerba 
mate. Mate (pronounced in two syllables) is a unique 
product confined largely to Paraguay and is worth a 
paragraph of description. It is seldom heard of in the 
northern hemisphere, but is the favourite and universal 
drink of twenty millions of people of the southern hemi- 
sphere. What tea is to the Englishman and Australian, 
what coffee is to the American and the Turk, mate is to 



PAEAGUAY, THE ISOLATED 227 

the Argentinian, Paraguayan, TJrguayan, and many 
Brazilians. It is also largely drunk in Chile and Peru. 
Make a dozen calls in an afternoon in some circles of 
Buenos Ayres, and you will be treated to a dozen cups of 
mate. 

The trees grow wild in large sections of Paraguay, and 
the leaves are carefully dried and packed in bales, cov- 
ered with raw hides, and thence transported to all parts 
of South America. When it reaches its destination, in 
the kitchen of the good housewife, it is reduced to pow- 
der, and placed in curious shaped gourds in which a lib- 
eral supply of sugar has previously been burned with 
live coals. Then hot water is poured on the powdered 
leaves, and the concoction is sucked through a silver or 
wooden tube, whose end is protected by a strainer to pre- 
vent the grounds from getting in. 

A genuine love for mate must be acquired, but that it 
is not difficult of acquisition is proved by the twenty 
millions whose constant beverage it is. It is one of the 
most harmless of stimulants, soothing rather than irritat- 
ing to the nerves, and it would be well if our tea and 
coffee topers would turn their attention to mate, and if it 
could be introduced to the frayed American nervous sys- 
tem by some enterprising and philanthropic firm of pur- 
veyors of new drinks. 

To turn once more from Paraguay tea to Paraguay re- 
public : — there is little doubt that if this tiny nation 
keeps on in her present course of peaceful development, 
she has an honourable and comfortable, if not a great 
future, before her. She has sufficient territory, a most 
fertile soil, a good variety of agricultural products, and a 
brave and patriotic people. They have proved their 
valour as soldiers, it now remains for them to prove their 
worth in paths of peace. 

This they will doubtless do, and those who have 



228 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

watched the troubled and war-shattered past of Paraguay 
will watch with new interest the rejuvenescence and 
progress of this isolated Indian Eepublic of the new 
world. 



BRAZIL, THE BOUNDLESS 

The Vast Size of Brazil— The Sailing Orders of Vasco de Gama— The 3d 
of May, 1500— What Cabral Found— Braail's Many Sources of Wealth 
— Agassiz's Opinion — Brazil Wood — The Paulistas — What Portugal 
Did for Brazil— The Coming of the Jesuits— The French Huguenots 
— The Dutch Occupation — The Discovery of Diamonds — Brazil as an 
Empire — Dom Pedro's Good Beign — Brazil as a Republic. 

THE title of this chapter is not so much of an ex. 
aggeration as it might seem at first glance, for 
Brazil is not only a country of enormous size, 
but on the west and north her boundaries are still in dis- 
pute and unsettled, as they have been for many years. 
Compared, too, with the tiny republics to the south, 
Uruguay and Paraguay, Brazil seems a boundless empire, 
embracing as she does one-half the territory and more 
than half the population of the continent. Her domains 
are as large as the island continent of Australia, and ex- 
ceed the area of the continental United States, leaving 
out Alaska. 

'' Sail directly south after leaving the Cape Yerde 
Islands in 14° north, as long as the wind is favourable. 
If forced to change your course keep on the starboard 
tack until you reach the latitude of the Cape of Good 
Hope, 34° south, then bear away to the east." Such 
were the sailing orders which resulted in the discovery of 
Brazil. They were given by the celebrated navigator 
Vasco de Gama to his lieutenant Pedro Alvarez Cabral, 
a Portuguese nobleman, who was about to sail for the 
East Indies. On the 9th of March, 1500, Cabral set sail 

229 



230 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

from Lisbon, and on the 3d of May (new style) he sighted 
the shores of Brazil where it bulges out into the Atlantic, 
as though about to shake hands with Africa on the op- 
posite hemisphere. The landfall that Cabral made was 
south of Bahia in the present state of the same name, and 
Brazil still keeps green the memory of her discovery, by 
an annual holiday. 

Being in the city of Sao Paulo on the 3d of May, four 
hundred and seven years after the discovery, I found 
everybody keeping holiday, while on the day before 
even the kindergarten children, in anticipation of the 
holiday, were cutting out Cabral' s picture and pasting it 
on a paper ship of their own make to show their loyalty 
to his memory. 

Cabral found the country inhabited by peaceful Indians 
of a low grade of intelligence, except the Arawaks who 
were said to have cultivated the soil, woven cloth and 
made rude pottery. No such civilization was found, 
however, as the Spaniards discovered on the other side 
of South America among the Incas of the Andes, and the 
early settlers of Brazil had comparatively little trouble 
in subduing and even enslaving many of the Indians. 
The aborigines were not sufficiently strong physically or 
mentally, or sufficiently reproductive, to long withstand 
the incursions of the white men, and they have never 
formed an important factor in the life of Brazil, as have 
the Indians of Chile, Peru and Bolivia in the countries 
west of the Andes. 

Brazil owes its predominant importance among the 
South American States to the productiveness of its soil 
and the variety of its resources, quite as much as to its 
vast size. It is not too much to say that every product that 
makes for the comfort and wealth of mankind is found in 
Brazil. Coffee, sugar, cotton, rubber, corn, wheat, dia- 
monds, gold, are only a few of her products, and the un- 



BEAZIL, THE BOUlirDLESS 231 

developed and even unexplored wealth of the country is 
infinitely greater than that which can be catalogued. 

The country rises abruptly but not inaccessibly from 
the shore for hundreds of miles, and the table-lands that 
lie back from the coast at a height of two or three thou- 
sand feet enjoy all the blessings of a temperate climate 
even when they lie within the tropics. Moreover,. the 
rainfall throughout almost the entire length and breadth 
of Brazil is sufScient to produce the most luxuriant vege- 
tation in the world, a luxuriance which led Amerigo 
Vespucci, the navigator who gave his name to both con- 
tinents, to say that '4f Paradise did exist on this planet, 
it could not be far from the Brazilian coast," while 
Agassiz believed that "the future centre of the civ- 
ilization of the world would be in the Amazon valley." 

The contrast in respect to verdure and vegetation be- 
tween the east and west coasts of Soath America is as 
the difference between the garden of Eden and the 
desert of Sahara. On the west coast for twenty-five hun- 
dred miles one scarcely sees a tree or a blade of grass, 
only sand-swept mountains, grand and impressive, to be 
sure, but forbidding in the extreme. 

Throughout the vast coast line of Brazil one can 
hardly conceive how another blade of grass could grow 
or another tree could stand in the crowded, luxuriant 
vegetation that now occupies the soil. Here, too, the 
largest river in the world pours its flood of waters into 
the Atlantic, and on its waters one can penetrate not 
only into the heart of the continent, but far over to the 
other side, by the tributaries of the Amazon, one can 
reach the rich mines of Bolivia and Peru. 

Such was the country of almost inconceivable potential 
wealth that was discovered by the Portuguese navigator 
on that memorable 3d of May in the first year of the 
sixteenth century. For a long time, however, Cabral's 



232 THE CONTII^ENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

discovery was put to little practical account, for neither 
gold nor silver were discovered for many years, and a 
country that did not produce either of the precious 
metals was considered of no value by the gold -dazzled 
Portuguese and Spaniards who then controlled the des- 
tinies of the new world. 

But Brazil did produce in great quantities a dye wood 
much esteemed in Europe and named "Brazil wood" 
long before the country took the same name. It meacs 
* ' wood the colour of fire, ' ' and the traveller in Eio Janeiro 
to-day sees in the centre of the Avenida Central, unquali- 
fiedly the most beautiful street in all the world, a long 
row of these trees from which Brazil took its name. 

Hunters for Brazil wood brought many ships to her 
shores, and little by little it was suspected that 
other valuable products might grow in the ''land of 
Brazil wood." Solitary colonists began to push into the 
interior, marry Indian wives, and form the nucleus of 
future colonies. One of the most enterprising of these 
adventurers was John Eamalho, who settled near the 
present great city of Sao Paulo. Others followed him, 
and then the "Paulistas," as they are called, became a 
distinct factor in the development of Brazil as they have 
remained ever since. The Paulistas spread over the 
open plains of the interior, overran the country to the 
south and west, even descended into Paraguay, and drove 
the Jesuits out of their hard-earned settlements. ' ' They 
were the pioneers of Brazil," says Dawson, " correspond- 
ing in character and habits, in the virtues of daring, 
hospitality and self-confidence, and in the vices of 
cruelty, rudeness and ignorance, with the pioneers of the 
Mississippi valley." To this day the Paulistas are 
the most enterprising and progressive citizens of Brazil, 
and Sao Paulo the most advanced of all the states. 

Another distinguishing characteristic of Brazil that 



BRAZIL, THE BOUNDLESS 233 

diflferentiated it from all the other countries of South 
America is that it was settled by the Portuguese. To the 
superficial observer it would seem to make very little 
difference whether one nation or the other of the Iberian 
Peninsula furnished the first settlers for a country, but, 
as a matter of fact, there are very decided differences 
between Spanish and Portuguese America ; differences of 
language, differences of architecture, differences of tra- 
dition and ideals. Every old house in Brazil, and many 
modern ones, will testify that the first settlers were Por- 
tuguese and not Spaniards, for we find none of the open 
patios or inside gardens which make Spanish houses so 
attractive, but high, closely-built brick walls, with scant 
and small windows, — an architecture not at all suited to 
the tropics. 

Fortunately for Brazil the early settlers came from 
Portugal in the brief golden age of that little kingdom, 
and brought with them ideals of personal and political 
liberty which never died out of their descendants. 
Through these valiant men that little strip of country on 
the coast of Spain has set her impress indelibly on the 
richest half of South America, and to-day four times as 
many people speak the Portuguese language in the new 
and greater Portugal across the seas as in the mother land. 

One of the most interesting episodes in the history of 
Brazil is the coming of the Jesuits, who under Father 
Jos6 de Anchieta, poet, hero and saint, and his con- 
temporaries, penetrated into the wilds of Brazil, count- 
ing not their lives dear unto them, and converting the 
Indians, at least nominally, by the tens of thousands. 
Father Anchieta was a contemporary of Francis Xavier, 
the founder of the order, and exhibited all the intrepid 
zeal and unlimited capacity for self-sacrifice which char- 
acterized the Jesuits in earlier and better days. 

One cannot help sympathizing with these heroic mis- 



234 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

sionaries, however one may deprecate their politics and 
their casuistry, for they were the only real friends the 
Indians had, in the early days of South America. They 
protected the aborigines, instructed them in the arts of 
agriculture, brought them together for their safety in 
fortified towns, which seemed as harbours of refuge for 
runaway slaves, escaping the intolerable cruelties of their 
taskmasters. For this reason the Jesuits were hated by 
the settlers, especially by the Paulistas, who pursued 
them relentlessly and at last broke their power, and 
largely drove them out of large sections of Brazil, but 
not before they had left a mark on the country that wiU 
never be effaced. 

More than once during the early centuries of Brazilian 
history, the ownership and future colonization of the 
country hung in the balance, and it looked as though a 
Calvinistic rather than a Catholic civilization would pre- 
vail. About the middle of the sixteenth century a strong 
expedition of French Huguenots, under Nicolas Ville- 
gagnon, was sent against Eio. It effected a landing on 
an island in the harbour which to this day is called 
Villegagnon's Island, and gave promise of dominating 
the city and perhaps all Brazil. But at the critical mo- 
ment the traitor Villegagnon sold out his own people, 
went over to the Catholic party, and returned to France, 
and the hopes of Admiral Coligny and the Huguenots of 
establishing a great Protestant colony in South America, 
were frustrated forever. 

More seriously still was the Portuguese power in Brazil 
threatened by the Dutch. In fact, for some years, the 
Hollanders ruled the greater part of Brazil, holding 
Pernambuco, Bahia and all the northern part of the 
country in an apparently secure grasp. But the Dutch 
East India Company which had undertaken the conquest 
of Brazil, was not heartily backed up by the home gov- 



BEAZIL, THE BOUNDLESS 235 

ernment, and after twenty-five years of desultory warfare 
and varied successes and defeats, the Dutch commander 
of Pernambuco surrendered on the 26th of January, 1655, 
and with this surrender ''four provinces, three cities, 
eight towns, fourteen fortified places, and nine hundred 
miles of coast were restored to the Portuguese crown." 
It was in large measure a religious war, for the devout 
Portuguese Catholic detested the Calvinistic Hollanders 
with all the rancour of theological hatred, and were de- 
termined to drive the heretical foreigners from their 
shores. 

The discovery of gold in 1690, and of diamonds in 1729, 
gave a tremendous impetus to immigration, and whole 
sections of Portugal seemed in danger of depopulation in 
consequence. The discovery of diamonds was as romantic 
as in the Kimberly district of South Africa. Some 
miners who were washing gold in the camp at Tijuca 
found some shining pebbles in the bottom of their pans, 
which they used as counters in their games for a long 
time. At last a wandering friar who had been in India 
declared them to be diamonds, and during the next forty 
years five million carats of these little shining stones 
went to deck the necks and fingers of European beauties. 
Even to-day these diamond mines, next to those in 
Kimberly, are the richest in the world. 

We must hasten over the uneventful years of the 
eighteenth century in Brazilian history, and come down 
to the year 1807, when E'apoleon's power and prestige 
were at their zenith, and he had all Europe except Great 
Britain at his feet. Portugal was one of these countries, 
and when he learned that the cowardly John PV, the 
Prince Eegent of Portugal, was playing fast and loose 
with him, and at the same time courting England's 
favour, he sent Junot to capture Lisbon. 

Just as Junot entered the city. Prince John with fifteen 



236 THE CONTDTENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

thousand of the nobility and fifty millions of treasure 
sailed out of the harbour, under convoy of the British 
fleet, bound for Brazil, — the greater Portugal across the 
seas. Six weeks later he reached Brazil and was received 
with open arms and great enthusiasm by the Brazilians, 
who were now to have a ruler of their own on their own 
soil. 

John was a wretchedly weak prince, and when the 
liberal spirit awoke in Portugal, and spread to Brazil, 
much against his will he agreed to give his people a 
liberal constitution, which indeed had already been 
promised by his sou. Prince Pedro. Mr. Dawson gives 
the following graphic account of the event : 

''On the 26th of February (1821) a great crowd as- 
sembled in the streets of Eio de Janeiro, and while the 
cowardly king skulked in his suburban palace, the Prince 
Pedro addressed the people, swearing in his father's name 
and his own to accept unreservedly the expected con- 
stitution. The multitude insisted on marching out to 
the king's palace to show their enthusiastic gratitude. 
Trembling with fear John, who did not know why they 
had come, was forced to get into his carriage, and the 
miserable man was frightened out of his wits when the 
crowd took the horses out to drag him with their own. 
hands. He fainted away and when he recovered his 
senses sat snivelling and protesting between his sobs his 
willingness to agree to anything, fearing that he was 
going to suffer the fate of Louis XVI. Thereafter, Dom 
Pedro, though only twenty-two years old, was the 
principal figure in Brazil." 

Soon after this the pusillanimous Prince Eegent de- 
parted for Portugal, and his son who became Dom Pe- 
dro I reigned in his stead. Brazil shortly afterwards be- 
came independent of Portugal with Dom Pedro as the 
first emperor. 



BEAZIL, THE BOUI^DLESS 237 

He was brave, ambitious, unscrupulous and thoroughly 
depraved in his private life, and he soon lost his hold on 
the affections and loyalty of his people, and in 1831 ab- 
dicated in favour of his young son and took refuge on 
a British warship. A few years of regency followed, 
and then as the people could agree on no other ruler, 
they called the boy of fifteen to the throne who was 
known throughout all his long and good reign of fifty 
years, as Dom Pedro H. 

A simple, good-natured, democratic, scholarly man, he 
grew up to be, caring more for his books than for state- 
craft, and mingling on the most familiar and friendly 
terms with his people. He would go about in shabby 
clothes and with a slouchy gait, and yet he was so genuine 
and kindly, and so virtuous in his private life, that his 
people thoroughly loved him, and his influence was alto- 
gether for good. He spent much of his time in Petropo- 
lis, a lovely mountain resort twenty-five miles from Eio, 
where all of the diplomats live to this day, and I was told 
by old residents that his favourite daily amusement was 
to go to the railway station on the arrival of the one train 
from the capital, and there to embrace his friends in the 
Brazilian style, and shake hands with all the foreign 
passengers. To this day the arrival and departure of the 
afternoon train is an event in Petropolis, and in their 
best clothes the inhabitants flock to the station to wel- 
come the coming and speed the parting guest. 

In 1876 Dom Pedro visited the United States, and was 
greatly interested in the Centennial Exhibition at Phil- 
adelphia, where he spent much time. It is said that 
the sudden impetus which Brazil received in industrial 
and commercial affairs dates from that memorable visit. 

However, in spite of Dom Pedro's popularity and 
goodness of heart and republican simplicity, he was not 
destined to finish his life as Emperor of Brazil, For 



238 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

fifty years he reigned and reigned well, but he frequently 
said that he was preparing the way for a republic. And 
so it proved, for one November night in 1889 the emperor 
was quietly informed by the provisional government 
that he was deposed and that henceforth Brazil was a 
federal republic. 

During the night the emperor and his family were put 
on shipboard and sent off to Lisbon, and the new repub- 
lic was born. The good emperor acquiesced in his de- 
position with excellent grace, and preferred perpetual 
exile from his beloved Brazil, rather than that a drop of 
Brazilian blood should be unnecessarily spilled. While 
I was in Brazil in May, 1907, the grandson of the good 
emperor came to Eio, but for prudential reasons he was 
not allowed to land, and no monarchical excitement was 
created by the event. 

The republic has had one or two stormy periods, 
especially when the navy under Admiral Mello, revolted 
in 1893, and held the harbour of Eio Janeiro and some of 
the outlying ports for nearly six months. But an Amer- 
ican admiral refused to allow the revolutionists to block- 
ade the port to foreign commerce, and President Floriano 
controlled the army and the government, so that the 
revolution which was for the purpose of restoring the 
monarchy, could make but little headway, and was soon 
crushed out. 

Since then Brazil's troubles have been chiefly financial 
ones, and even these have not been overwhelming. The 
republic which was perhaps at first premature, born of 
the ambition of army officers, is apparently thoroughly 
established in the affections of the great majority of the 
people. Since its advent Brazil has awakened to a new 
life. Commercially and intellectually she was never so 
prosperous as to-day. Whether her spiritual growth has 
kept pace with her commercial expansion is perhaps a 



BEAZIL, THE BOUNDLESS 239 

question, but even in the higher realms mighty forces are 
at work in evangelical churches and schools for the mak- 
ing of the new Brazil. 

Other chapters will tell of these forces as well as of the 
new spirit of improvement which has made of Eio, the 
capital, the most beautiful of cities, and has infused a 
fresh life into the remotest districts of the great republic. 



XXIX 

RIO DE JANEIRO, THE CITY BEAUTIFUL 

The Harbour of Rio— Compared with Sydney and Cape Town— The 
Awakening of Rio de Janeiro — Making a City Over — The Avenida 
Central— What was Accomplished in Two Years — The Avenida by 
Night— Gloria Hill to Botofogo— How the City Made Money— The 
Great Port Works — The Monroe Palace. 

AFTEE seeing most of the principal cities of the 
world, I had settled down to the opinion that 
Buda Pesth and Stockholm were, on the whole, 
in my estimation, the most beautiful of modern capitals, 
but I had not then seen Eio de Janeiro, the federal capital 
of Brazil. 

Of course every one has heard of the harbour of Eio, 
and it is admitted to be unrivalled. The harbour of 
Sydney is the only one that is ever compared with it by 
those familiar with the world's harbours, and Sydney, 
though it has its own special and unrivalled beauties, is 
inferior in many respects. Sydney's port stretches out 
in every direction, running for fifty miles inland like a 
gigantic cuttlefish, sending its tentacles far up into the 
country, and affording innumerable lovely bays and 
charming vistas, where the land and water meet. But 
so does the harbour of Eio, though it is not quite so ex- 
tensive. Yet so large is this great tidal inlet, that the 
first explorers thought it was a river, and, as it was the 
26th day of January (some say the 1st), called it the 
Eiver of January, Eio de Janeiro. 

Sydney has its ''Heads," the great flat-topped hills 
that stand guard at the entrance of the harbour, but the 
bay is so huge that Sydney Heads are scarcely visible 

240 




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EIO DB JANEIEO 241 

from Sydney City. But Eio de Janeiro has its Corco- 
vado, almost overhanging the city, looking as though it 
would topple over upon the housetops, though the mighty 
mountain has stood for hundreds of years without a 
tremour, and seems likely to stand for hundreds of years 
to come. 

Eio, too, has its " Sugar Loaf," a sugar loaf more than 
a thousand feet high rising out of the sea, and weighing 
billions of tons. The "Hay Stack" would be perhaps 
a more appropriate name, for it is rounded on its top and 
sides, and does not taper to a point. Always in the 
sight of the people of Eio, who look for them, too, is 
Cavea and the Organ Mountains, like the pipes of some 
gigantic organ, and the "Finger of God," all washed, as 
it were, by the salt sea that flows in and out around 
them, laving them with its life-giving tides and singing 
to them the ceaseless music of the sea. Cape Town, with 
its Table Mountain and its Lion's Head dominating the 
city, is the only seaport that compares in respect of 
mountain views, with Eio, and Cape Town has not the 
splendid land-locked harbour in which the "navies of 
the world can ride," as has Eio. 

But for all these wonders of nature, the traveller is 
prepared. He has heard of them, he has read of them, 
he has, perhaps, dreamed of them, but, for the wonders 
of the city itself, he is not prepared, unless he is very 
much up-to-date, for they have largely been created 
within the last two years. 

Suddenly Eio de Janeiro seemed to arouse herself from 
the sleep of centuries, and say : "I will be beautiful, as 
well as great, and I will make my streets and the build- 
ings which line them, worthy of the unrivalled situation 
which nature has given me." But this was no easy un- 
dertaking. It would have staggered a Boss Shepherd, 
or a Yankee magnate with tens of millions at his dis- 



242 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

posal. In an old world city it would have been thought 
absolutely impossible, but these South American cities 
have a way of laughing at impossibilities {vide Buenos 
Ayres, as well as Eio Janeiro). They may seem com- 
paratively dormant for decades and then suddenly emerge 
from their chrysalis, like one of their own brilliant 
butterflies that dazzle the fields in their blue and gold 
glory. 

As I have said, Eio had unusual obstacles to overcome. 
Her streets were for the most part narrow, unwholesome 
thoroughfares that held the heat and excluded the air. 
There was no great avenue to serve as a channel for the 
lifegiving winds from the sea, for the streets ran in such 
a way as to shut out the prevailing breezes. These 
streets, too, were wretchedly paved, and slow mule cars 
crawled haltingly and stumbliugly along, stopping to pick 
up a passenger wherever one offered himself. 

Most of the houses were mediaeval structures in the 
Portuguese style, and there was little to boast of in the 
way of architecture three short years ago. Worse than 
all else, yellow fever ravaged the city over and over 
again, until it got the name of being one of the worst 
pest holes in the world. Tourists avoided it, merchants 
were afraid to live in it. The ambassadors and other 
diplomats foregathered in Petropolis, a beautiful resort 
on the hills 3,000 feet above the sea, and nearly two 
miles from Eio. The emperor himself lived there for a 
large part of the year, and Petropolis (Peter's City) be- 
came the real capital of the country, rather than Eio. 

This state of affairs continued down to and into this 
new twentieth century. In fact, until something like 
three years ago, when the giant city yawned, turned 
over, shook herself and determined to become "Eio the 
Beautiful," the finest city in the continent, — perhaps in 
the world. 



EIO DE JANEIEO 243 

I am prepared for disclaimers of the statement and for 
scofi&ng remarks about the too vigorous imagination of 
an impressionable traveller. One who has not visited 
Eio since the beginning of 1906 will scarcely credit what 
I relate. Had I seen the old Eio and not the new, I 
could not myself have believed that such changes were 
possible in so short a time. Photographs can do little 
justice to the new city, any more than to the magnificent 
harbour by which it sits. 

The task undertaken and largely carried out is not the 
building of a city where no city existed before. That 
were a comparatively easy task, but the new Eio 
necessitated the pulling down of the old Eio, and clearing 
off the ruins, before another could be built. The old 
city was compactly built, the streets were narrow and 
cheerless. Where the great '^Avenida Central" runs, 
there was no street at all, just solid blocks of brick and 
stone houses, every one of which had to be demolished 
and cleared away before the street which I will not 
hesitate to pronounce the finest in the world, could be 
built. 

The Mayor of the City was a man of vision and of 
faith. He was not a young man but he had a young 
man's ideals and courage. He was backed up by 
councillors and citizens who shared his views, — the 
work was begun and under his successors it has been 
continued, and, wonder of wonders ! in less than three 
years largely accomplished, or at least so far completed 
that one can catch the projector's vision of "the city 
Beautiful." 

Think for a moment of the stupendous character of the 
task ! In the way of the one Central Avenue alone, 
which the city determined to construct, were five hun- 
dred and ninety houses and stores of all descriptions. 
These must be bought (disappropriated), condemned and 



244 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

demolished. Seven million five hundred thousand dollars 
in gold were paid for these houses. They were taken by 
the city at their assessed valuation, which in some cases 
proved to be much less than the rental value. But the 
tax dodgers were taken at their word by the city fathers, 
and the public wasted no sympathy on them, when they 
only got half the value of their property. 

At once the destruction of the old rookeries began. 
On the 8th day of March, 1904, the first house was de- 
molished. One year, eight months and seven days later, 
on the 15th of November, 1905, the Brazilian Independ- 
ence Day, the Avenida was opened to the public. As I 
write, but one year and a half has elapsed since this 
street was made passable, and yet it can already claim, 
as I have said, to be the most beautiful street in the 
whole world, and in the view of an unprejudiced 
traveller it will, I think, justify its claim. 

It is a mile and an eighth long, over a hundred feet 
wide, and lined on either side with artistic, and often 
truly imposing and even magnificent buildings. To be 
sure, some of these buildings are rather florid and ornate 
to suit the severest taste, but they are all fresh, bright, 
and, most of them, architecturally beautiful. "Each 
structure," we are told, "must conform to a plan in 
which the details of architecture and rules of hygiene 
are preserved." The roadway is paved with asphalt, and 
down its centre are fifty-five little ovals of flowers and 
foliage plants with one Brazil tree springing from the 
middle of the oval. (The Brazil tree is a typical and 
beautiful shade tree, from which the country received its 
name.) "From each oval, too, springs an ornamental 
pillar, bearing three arc lights ; at the edge of the walks 
in spaces alternating with the electric lights, are one hun- 
dred and four pillars with gas jets of the highest illu- 
minating power, gas being used with electricity, both to 



EIO DE JANEIEO 245 

increase the brilliancy and to avoid any danger from the 
sudden breaking down of the electric lights." 

The sight of the Avenida by night is as beautiful as by 
day, and it is almost as bright, for the thousands of pow- 
erful lights illumine not only the roadway, but light up 
the palatial stores and office buildings that line this great 
street from one end to the other. The broad sidewalks 
on which ten people can walk abreast are mosaics made 
of black and white flints brought from Portugal for the 
purpose and laid after the Lisbon style by Portuguese 
workmen. Up and down the smooth roadway automo- 
biles of the latest pattern tear, undeterred by a speed 
limit, tooting unmelodious horns and emitting just as 
noisome smells as if they were in London or New York. 
■ But not even the omnipresent automobile can cloud for 
more than a moment the fair scene, or defile for long the 
pure air that sweeps through the beautiful Avenida, 
which is open at both ends to the sea and the sea breezes. 
At the north it opens on the inner harbour, with Petrop- 
olis and Kictheroy on the further side, while at the 
south it strikes the outer harbour with the picturesque 
islands and gigantic towering mountains of rock which 
have long made Eio famous. 

Through this great central avenue blow the winds of 
heaven by day and by night, and into it from above 
pours the sunlight from brilliant and often unclouded 
skies, and this mighty artery has had much to do with 
purifying the city, reducing the death-rate, abolishing 
fever and plague and making it one of the healthiest 
cities in the world. 

But the Avenida Central is only, as it were, the con- 
necting link between equally beautiful boulevards. On 
the north side, an avenue used more for business than 
for pleasure, connects the Avenida with the new harbour 
works, but on the other side it stretches around Gloria 



246 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

Hill to Botofogo, a wonderful crescent sliaped bay, and 
then, on and on, to the open Atlantic under the head of 
mighty Corcovado itself, which seems to look down un- 
moved on all these mai'vellous improvements in the city 
over which it has so long kept guard. 

Along this drive for much of the way the surf dashes 
up against the fine stone battlements and on the other side 
are narrow parks filled with rare and brilliant flowers 
and trees now in their infancy, but which will make the 
whole fifteen miles of the drive a bower of loveliness. 
This drive for natural beauty and for skillful adornment 
is not equalled, I believe, in all the world. The Avenida 
Central and its boulevard extensions on either side do not 
by any means make the sum total of the new Eio. Seven 
and three-fourth miles of streets have been or are being 
widened and transformed from narrow dirty lanes into 
handsome business avenues, and the city has ventured 
upon a loan of twenty millions of dollars to accomplish 
it. Eleven hundred houses will be demolished and in 
some cases the streets will not only be widened but 
run through the old blocks, as was the Central 
Avenue. 

Strange to say, out of all this destruction and recon- 
struction, the city has made money, for the land on the 
new streets is worth far more than the old buildings 
which were condemned and demolished, and it has been 
eagerly bought by merchants who desire to have their es- 
tablishments on the best streets. But of com'se the sale 
of the land which the city disappropriated has not paid 
all the enormous bills contracted in building, in three 
short years, the City Beautiful, and the government has 
gone into debt to the extent of fifty millions of dollars 
for the new city. 

It is worth it all, the traveller will declare, and so far 
the city seems to have had no trouble in interesting the 



EIO DE JANEIEO 247 

Eothschilds and other capitalists in lier plans and bor- 
rowing money at reasonable rates. 

The "port works " is another of the gigantic and vastly 
important improvements which is being carried on at the 
same time with the building of the new streets of Eio. 
At this writing (June, 1907), one has to get ashore as 
best he can from the great liners. It is an unseemly 
scramble with extortionate charges by the boatmen, and 
exasperating delays, and an extraordinary thoroughness of 
search on the part of the custom-house officers. In a 
few months the "port works" will be completed, and a 
solid stone wall front, with piers, quays, warehouses, and 
all modern electrical appliances for handling freight, will 
extend a distance of two and one-fifth miles up the inner 
harbour. Then the travellers' tribulations on landing at 
Eio will be largely things of the past, and he will step 
from the gangplank on to terra firma and obtain with his 
first step on shore an impression of substantial utility, as 
well as of the great natural beauty of the harbour. 

I have written with ardour, I am aware, of this 
noble city, and have not spared the superlatives because 
they are all deserved. I can hardly expect those who 
have not visited Eio within three years to share my en- 
thusiasm, scarcely to believe my story, for much of the 
city is so new, so fresh, so unstained by the hand of time, 
that even the inhabitants themselves are scarcely able to 
realize what has been accomplished. 

The "Monroe Palace," so called, which stands at one 
end of the Avenida, is as bright and sparkling as when 
it stood in the World's Fair at St. Louis, for there is no 
smoke or grimy fog to disfigure and besmirch the purity 
of the buildings. Here the Pan American Congress held 
its meetings during Secretary Eoot's important visit, and 
it is a typical building, typical of the beauty and strength 
of new Brazil, typical, too, when we consider its name 



248 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

and the use to which it was put, of the new and brotherly 
aspirations which are stirring in the heai'ts of Brazilians 
towards tlieir great neighbour in the north, for nowhere 
else in South America ai'e North Americans more popu- 
lar and welcome. 

This chapter, to be fully rounded out, seems to suggest 
a question. If llio de Janeiro can accomplish such won- 
derful things in two short years, why cannot New York, 
Chicago, London and Glasgow, with their greater wealth, 
beautify and ennoble their municipalities in like 
manner ? 

Who will rub Aladdin's lamp for them, and evolve 
other Cities Beautiful ? 



XXX 

THE WORLD'S COFFEE CUP AND HOW IT IS FILLED 

Brazil, One-fifteenth of Habitable Globe— The Brazilian Tonic— Too Large 
Doses of the Stimulant — Controlling the Price of Coffee — Jahu in the 
Coffee Dlbtrict — A Brazilian Troly — A Great Fazenda — How a Coffee 
Tree Looks — Preparing the Berries for Market — How Many Cups 
Have the Brazilian Plantations Filled ?— Reckoned in Trillions- 
Breakfast on the Fazenda— How the Coffee is Made. 

"They have in Turkey a drink called coffee. . . . The drink 
oomforteth the brain and heart and helpeth digestion." — Bacon. 

THE world's coffee cup is filled by Brazil. There 
is no doubt about it. Three-fourths of all the 
coffee that the world and his wife complacently 
sip at the breakfast table, Mocha, Java, Eio, whichever 
you prefer, is grown on the red soil of the uplands of 
Brazil. 

It is a well known fact that Brazil can and does pro- 
duce every kind of coffee grown in the world. No pains 
or money have been spared to import seed from Arabia, 
Java and Bourbon, of the best varieties known there. It 
is further stated that ''the conditions of soil and climate 
and the vast extent of country, the rich lands peculiarly 
adapted to coffee, the immunity from disease, and the 
abundance of labour, make it almost certain that she will 
practically monopolize the coffee production of the world 
so long as these conditions continue." ^ 

When we remember the further facts that Brazil is one- 
fifteenth of the habitable globe, one-fifth of both Americas 
and three-sevenths of South America, we see what a huge 

^ The Brazilian Bulletin. 
249 



250 THE CONXmBNT OF OPPOETUNITY 

cofifee plantation there is from which the world's coffee 
cup can be filled. 

To be sure, the whole of Brazil is not adapted to the 
production of coffee, but millions and tens of millions of 
her acres are suited to the redolent berry, and the great 
problem which confronts Brazil is not how to augment 
but how to reduce or at least keep stationary the coffee 
crop so that the price may not fall to a ruinously low 
figure. 

Whether or not coffee is a health-giving tonic to the 
individual as most people claim, in spite of the assevera- 
tions of the enterprising people of Battle Creek and the 
counter-claims of Postum, it is certain that it has proved 
a powerful tonic to the prosperity of Brazil, for, owing 
to her wealth in coffee, she has rebuilt her cities, im- 
proved their drainage, banished yellow fever, and taken 
on within the last dozen years a new lease of national and 
industrial life. 

Santos, for instance, the great coffee port from which 
nearly three-fourths of the coffee of the world is shipped, 
is no longer a pest-hole dreaded of all navigators, but a 
clean, healthy town, with splendid stone docks that put 
to shame the flimsier structures of New York and Boston. 

The only question about coffee as a national tonic is 
whether like all stimulants it may not be overdone, and 
a reaction set in which may for a time disorder the na- 
tional heart. Indeed, this reaction from an overstimu- 
lant has already set in, and Brazil is feeling serious ef- 
fects from it. The state of Sao Paulo has forbidden the 
planting of any more coffee trees for five years, under 
penalty of a serious fine. The first five years of this pro- 
hibition are nearly spent, and the legislature will un- 
doubtedly renew the prohibition for another half decade. 
But Sa6 Paulo, though the chief coffee producing state, 
is only one of several where the berry can be grown, and 



THE WOELD'S COFFEE CUP 251 

it is expected that the next congress will apply the same 
law to all Brazil. 

In the meantime the government has developed a plan 
for buying up all the surplus coffee and holding it so 
long as is necessary to prevent a drop in the price. Al- 
ready it is said that there are five million bags on hand, 
and the end is not in sight. Indeed, the attempt to cor- 
ner the coffee market of the world may produce serious 
demoralization of the national finances. 

These facts are sufficient to show the importance of the 
coffee cup in the economics of Brazil, and add interest to 
a visit to a coffee plantation in the heart of Sao Paulo, 
the most progressive state in the Brazilian union. 

My friend. Colonel Feraz, of Jahii, had invited me and 
a dozen mutual friends to visit his fazenda or coffee farm, 
a few miles from the town. Jahii, you must know, is in 
the heart of the great state of S§,o Paulo and in the heart 
of the coffee district as well. The soil is the colour 
of brick dust, and the roads and sidewalks and the 
houses, where the water in the frequent rains has splashed 
up on them, are all red. Even one's linen, his face and 
his hair, take on a reddish hue after a short ride or walk 
on a dusty day. 

The town itself is a compact, well built place of some 
fourteen thousand inhabitants, whose sole business is 
coffee. They not only drink coffee several times a day, 
but sell coffee, raise coffee, talk coffee, and, for what I 
know, dream coffee. All about the town the open country 
slopes upward, and is covered with coffee trees, to the 
right, to the left, to the north, to the south, everywhere 
is coffee. Our friend's fazenda is some five miles out of 
town, and bright and early one May morning half a dozen 
trolys drew up at the door of the little hotel, to take us 
all out to the fazenda. Now a Brazilian troly is not an 
American trolley, but is nothing more or less than a 



252 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

buckboard drawn by mules, — a vehicle that answers ad- 
mirably for the rough country roads of Brazil. 

The Brazilian mule, too, is an animal to be admired, 
as well as respected, for the strength of his heels. He is 
a sleek, clean, handsome, strongly built fellow, and when 
attached to one of the handsome equipages of Eio, with 
silver-mounted harness, he surpasses his prouder ancestor, 
the horse. In the country the mules, though not so finely 
accoutred, are just as handsome and willing, and they 
took us out over the hills and valleys to the fazenda of 
their master in very creditable time. 

"When within about a mile of the house, as we were 
driving through an avenue of coffee trees, our host mod- 
estly remarked, ''These are my trees," and we found 
that as far as the eye could see up hill and down dale his 
trees extended. 

"How many trees have you ? " we asked. 

And he almost took our breath away by replying, 
"Four hundred and thirty thousand." He went on to 
explain that these trees were in the original estate of his 
father, which had been inherited by three or four broth- 
ers, but that they worked the estate in common, though 
his individual share would be only a hundred thousand 
odd trees. 

The full grown tree is about twelve feet high, of bushy 
and rather dense growth. The leaves are a beautiful, 
glossy dark green, in shape like those of our edible chest- 
nut, and the coffee berries grow on the twigs and small 
branches and close to the wood. First they are green, 
then turn to a deep red or yellow, and, finally, when 
fully ripe, become almost black. In May they are at 
their handsomest, for the red berries contrast beautifully 
with the glossy green leaves, and glow like rubies in 
their dark setting. The red berries look for all the 
world like Cape Cod cranberries, but taste very unlike 



THE WOELD'S COFFEE CUP 253 

them, for a sweetish pulp under the outer husk envelops 
the hard berry of commerce. . 

"When the berries are ripe they are stripped off by 
hand and fall to the ground beneath the tree, where 
they are gathered up by another set of workmen and 
carried to the factory, where they are washed and 
thoroughly dried, and then put through a machine 
which breaks off the hull. This being lighter is blown 
out by a strong current of air to the back of the factory, 
while the heavier kernel falls into its appropriate bin. 
From this it is again lifted and by ingenious machinery 
passed over an Iron sieve with holes of various sizes, and 
thus automatically sorts itself ; the small round berries, 
which are the most valuable, dropping by themselves 
into their appropriate receptacle. 

Then the winnowed, hulled and sorted coffee is put 
into bags each of which weighs sixty kilos, or 132 
pounds, and is ready for storage or for export as the 
case may be. 

Up to a certain point coffee improves with age, so that 
when the crop is particularly heavy, as it is every four 
or five years, the berries can be stored to advantage, to 
await the leaner years which are sure to follow a bumper 
crop. 

After we had been introduced to the family at the 
fazenda, our host took us over his plantation, only a 
fraction of it, of course, for days would not have sufficed 
to drive through the miles and miles of rows of trees that 
belonged to him and his brothers. All the rows were 
straight, clean, well-cultivated and flourishing. Scarcely 
a dead tree could be seen or a dead branch on any tree. 
When a tree dies out for any reason, another is planted 
(the law allows old plantations to be thus renewed) and 
for a year or two is protected from summer's sun and the 
winter's frost by a slight covering. At four years of age 



254 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

the trees begin to bear, and continue in bearing for fifty 
years and in many instances even longer. 

While we were driving through the plantation, our 
host gave us some facts about the coffee industry, which 
were startling in their size. In the state of Sao Paulo 
seven hundred million coffee trees are found, and twenty- 
five million in the Jahii district alone. In the year 1906, 
which was an exceptionally good year, the trees of Sao 
Paulo averaged nearly four pounds of coffee to the tree. 
In 1907, however, fortunately for the price of coffee, the 
average yield was not half as great. 

In all Brazil the j^roduction of coffee in 1906 was esti- 
mated at twenty millions of bags of 132 pounds each, or 
two hundred and sixty four billion pounds. Beckoning 
fifty cups of coffee to the pound, if my arithmetic is not 
at fault in such enormous figures, the Brazilian crop of a 
single year would fill the world's coffee cup thirteen 
trillion, two hundred billion times. Of course the small 
after dinner cups, which are usually used in Brazil, could 
be filled three times as often, but these figures involved 
stagger computation, and I will leave it to my reader to 
work out the larger problem of the smaller cup. 

To return to the fazenda, after visiting different parts 
of the plantation, and seeing his orange groves and the 
houses of his labourers, our kind host brought us back 
for breakfast to the chief residence on the fazenda, where 
his brothers and his wife lived. This substantial meal in 
Brazil usually comes at eleven or twelve o'clock, and on 
Colonel Feraz' fazenda it was certainly an elaborate 
function. Beginning with soup, roast chicken, roast 
beef, and roast mutton, followed in quick succession, 
while the piece de resistance was a whole sucking pig 
without which no such state breakfast would be deemed 
complete. Fruits and sweets followed ; the sweets ex- 
ceedingly sweet. One variety called in Portuguese, 



THE WOELD'S COFFEE CUP 255 

" maiden's kisses " being so very sweet as to be cloying 
to the taste. The cynical bachelor would doubtless say 
that this was why it received its name. 

Of course the feast wound up with coffee, and such 
coffee ! One must visit a fazenda in Brazil to find a per- 
fect cup of coffee From the tree to the mill, to the 
coffee-pot, to the table, with no chance for the admixture 
of chicory or acorns, with a Brazilian housewife to 
make it, — then one gets the aromatic berry in its 
perfection. 

In a Brazilian home the coffee is roasted and ground 
fresh each time it is made. It is not boiled, but is re- 
duced to a powder and packed in a conical woollen bag. 
Hot water is then poured through it twice, so that it is a 
percolation, not a decoction, that is served. 

The host and hostess waited on the guests assiduously 
and never sat down to share the viands with them, for 
this is Brazilian hospitality. 

A coffee fazenda is not usually a place of great luxury 
or style. These things are reserved for the town houses, 
and, except in the large cities, living is on a simple and 
unostentatious style. At Colonel Feraz' fazenda, the 
piano, on which the Brazilian young ladies play ex- 
cellently, was the chief article of furniture in the living- 
room, shared by a comfortable hammock and a number 
of chairs, which were taken into the dining-room when 
breakfast was served. 

All day long the sturdy mules, three abreast, kept 
bringing great cart-loads of coffee berries to the mill, and 
other carts were equally busy carrying away the bags of 
hulled and sorted berries. Many thousands of cups of 
coffee would be made from that day's work at this one 
mill, and practically the mill is kept busy the year 
around. 

After the breakfast, our generous hosts brought out a 



256 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

great two-bushel bag of delicious oranges, from which 
every one was invited to eat all he desired and then fill 
his pockets. 

The westering sun at last reminded us that it was time 
to return to Jahii. The day had been so full of pleasure 
and instruction and we felt that no one's education was 
complete if he had not spent at least one day on a 
Brazilian fazenda. 



XXXI 

A THOUSAND MILES IN BRAZIL ^ 

Some Early Morning Starts— Seen From the Car Window — Maine and 
Brazil — The Fine City of Sao Paulo — The Beginnings of Christian 
Endeavour in Brazil — A Wet Picnic — The Brazilian Hug — A Coven- 
tion in the Coffee District — Hospitality of the Daily Papers — The 
Generosity of Brazilian Officials — " Until a Little While." 

THIS chapter might just as truthfally be headed 
three thousand miles in Brazil, for adding the 
two thousand miles of coast line, from the edge 
of Uruguay to Pernambuco, to the thousand miles we 
have travelled overland from and to the capital by rail, 
a good three thousand has been covered. However, 
since we have gone ashore at but two or three ports on 
the coast, I will confine myself to our travel by land, in 
order to reach the four Christian Endeavour conventions 
at Sao Paulo, Jahii, Eio Claro and Campinas. These 
were in addition to the national and South American 
conventions held at Eio de Janeiro, which were meetings 
of remarkable power and influence. 

These busy days of travel and convention-going fre- 
quently began long before daylight and often ended at 
about midnight. I do not suppose that all the trains in 

^ Though this whole journey to South America was in the interests 
of the Christian Endeavour movement, the author has not Included in 
this volume details of the many Christian Endeavour meetings held. 
An account of the rapid progress of this cause in South America will be 
found in other publications. He has given in this connection, how- 
ever, the story of one Christian Endeavour trip, since it describes 
certain phases of South American life, which should not be omitted 
from such a volume. 

257 



258 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

Brazil start at 5:30 in the morning, but it seemed to me 
that all I needed to take were scheduled for that hour, 
which often involved getting up and routing up our 
patient hosts at 4 A. m., two hours before daylight in 
this southern clime. 

After the inevitable cofifee with which every Brazilian, 
from the loftiest to the lowliest, begins the day, we 
would start on our pilgrimage, which sometimes did not 
end until sundown. 

Travelling in the settled parts of the United States of 
Brazil, is very much like travelling in the United States 
of America. The cars are on the North American pat- 
tern and some of them were built at Wilmington, Dela- 
ware. Many of the engines are from the Baldwin loco- 
motive works in Philadelphia, and the assiduous con- 
ductor punches the tickets in the same way but a little 
oftener and a trifle more politely than our own knights of 
the railway. 

As I looked out of the car window, too, I could often 
imagine myself on my native North American heath. 
Some parts of the country look like Maine in the neigh- 
bourhood of Moosehead Lake ; great reaches of forest 
with blue mountains in the dim distance. But when we 
came nearer to the forests I could see that we were in 
sunny Brazil, where it is summer nine months of the 
year and early autumn the other three. Here were palm 
trees and breadfruit trees with their great glossy leaves, 
and cotton trees bursting into bloom, while other trees 
were a perfect mass of bright red blossoms without a leaf 
showing. I was often reminded of Moses' burning bush 
as the train flashed by the flaming forest, every blossom a 
tongue of fire. 

And the coffee trees, — you see nothing like them in 
Maine or California or Florida, for the world's coffee comes 
from Brazil. Mocha and Java coffee as well as Eio, the 



A THOUSAND MILES IN BEAZIL 259 

seed having been imported from these countries. Acres 
and acres, miles and miles, leagues and leagues of coffee. 

But these things are all by the way, literally, and the 
way led to the four Christian Endeavour conventions of 
which I have spoken. The first one was at S§,o Paulo, 
the capital of the state of the same name, and some three 
hundred miles from Eio de Janeiro. S^o Paulo is con- 
sidered the most progressive and modern state in Brazil, 
and the city of Sao Paulo is a worthy capital of such a 
state. It is about as large as its namesake, St. Paul, 
Minnesota, has weU-paved streets, lined with substantial 
buildings, and a splendid electric street-car service of 
American installation. 

To many of my readers the city is interesting because 
it has long been the chief centre of Christian Endeavour in 
South America. Here Dr. and Mrs. Fenn laboured when 
the former was professor in McKenzie College, and from 
them the society gained its first great impetus, though a so- 
ciety had previously been formed in Botucatei by Miss E. C. 
Hough. In Sao Paulo lived the indefatigable secretary, 
Dr. Eleizer dos Sanctos Saraiva, and the first president 
of the Brazilian Union, Eev. Erasmo Braga, and other 
leaders of the movement. Though the national head- 
quarters has now been removed to Eio de Janeiro, S§.o 
Paulo wiU long maintain its prominence in Christian En- 
deavour circles. 

The meetings here were large and helpful. The attend- 
ance certainly was all that could be desired, and " stand- 
ing room only, and not much of that" might have been 
the sign at all the evening meetings. 

The picnic afternoon spent in a pleasant park near Sao 
Paulo was somewhat interfered with by the rain, but 
Brazilian Endeavourers are not to be daunted by a few 
showers, and they turned out in large numbers and 
seemed to enjoy a wetting as well as an outing. 



260 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

Long before daylight on the morning after the last late 
meeting at Sao Paulo, we started for Jahii, three hundred 
miles away in the interior, in the richest coffee region of 
the world. This, too, was an all-day's journey, but it 
was far from monotonous, for the scenery was fine, and 
the new trees and fruits and flowers that we saw by the 
way added considerably to our botanical lore. Some- 
times brilliant birds would flash through the dark trees, 
and, occasionally, a flock of wild ostriches would lift their 
wings and scud from the approaching railway train. 

At many stations companies of Endeavourers would be 
waiting to give us the Brazilian hug and pat on the back, 
and to wish us all manner of blessings in their soft, 
melodious Portuguese. Some of these Endeavourers went 
on with us to Jahii, so that when we arrived there 
towards evening, the convention was at once organized 
and was soon in full swing. 

I was much surprised to see over the door of the 
Presbyterian church the familiar Christian Endeavour 
monogram in electric lights, red and white, and for a 
moment had to rub my eyes to see whether I was in 
North America or South America. 

Here is a land where half a century ago Protestantism 
was unknown, and where a quarter of a century ago its 
missionaries were persecuted almost unto death ; a point 
far back from the centres of population, where now a 
Christian Endeavour convention could be carried on with 
as much enthusiasm and dignity as in New York or York- 
shire. Here was a district convention in the heart of 
Brazil which attracted as much attention, perhaps more, 
than any similar gathering would do in Great Britain or 
the United States. 

The two daily papers gave large space to it : — one of 
them occupied almost aU of its front page with the 
programme. The leading political leaders of both 



A THOUSAND MILES IN BRAZIL 261 

parties, thougli Eoman Catholics, attended nearly all the 
services, aud the mayor of the city called upon us and 
expressed his great interest in the meetings. 

It was a genuine Christian Endeavour convention too. 
None of our principles or leading features were ignored 
or forgotten. The prayer-meeting, the committees, the 
pledge, the interdenominational fellowship, were all made 
prominent, and our friends in Jahii evidently knew the 
spirit as well as the forms of Christian Endeavour. 

One day after the convention was over was spent on a 
"Fazenda," or coffee farm, where our host was the 
owner of 430,000 coffee trees all in bearing, but that day 
was so rich in new experiences that it needs a whole 
chapter to do it justice. 

The meetings at Eio Claro and at Campifias were for 
only one evening each, but large audiences and earnest 
Endeavourers characterized them both, and they were 
graced by the presence of the officials of the city who 
thus showed not only their tolerance but their apprecia- 
tion of Protestantism, — a remarkable thing in a strongly 
Catholic country like Brazil. 

All the way along, from the first moment of our arrival 
until the hour of embarkation, the officials have been 
most kind. A special car the government provided iBree 
of charge to take us and some forty Endeavourers to 
Sao Paulo, and special launches met our steamer, pro- 
vided without expense to our friends by the custom- 
house authorities. The same courtesy was extended on 
our return to the steamer, and all the Endeavourers who 
wished to go, accompanied us to the ship that was to 
carry us homeward. 

On our return to Eio we found that the Oravia 
would be four days late in sailing, and our friends took 
advantage of it by arranging four extra meetings in the 
city and suburbs, and in Nictheroy across the bay, — the 



262 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

capital of the state of Eio de Janeiro. A farewell meet- 
ing in The Central Mission Hall on the evening before 
we sailed completed the series of meetings which to me 
will be memorable as long as I live, and which my 
friends assure me have done much for the cause of Chris- 
tian Endeavour in Brazil. 

The only fault I can find with them is that they had 
too much of the President of the "World's Union in them, 
for when I came to reckon it up I find that he had spoken 
no less than forty-four times in twenty-four days, and he 
was quite exhausted when he sailed for home. 

I think it was Nero to whom the atrocious sentiment 
is attributed, that he wished all Eome had one neck that 
he might chop it off with one blow. I could wish that 
all Brazilian friends for a moment at least had one hand 
that I might take it in a fraternal grasp and tell them 
how much I appreciate their hearty greetings, their oft- 
expressed good wishes, their unwearied attentions, their 
affectionate farewells. To my interpreters I owe an 
especial debt of gratitude, especially to Mr. Myron Clark, 
secretary of the flourishing Y. M. C. A. in Eio de Janeiro 
who interpreted for me at more than thirty meetings. 

The Brazilians have an expression which I heard a 
thousand times, which being literally translated means : 
'' Until a little while." It may be many years before I 
return to Brazil, if ever, but in the years of eternity it 
will be only " until a little while " that we meet again. 
Then "Ate Loga," dear friends, "ate loga" — "^ntil 
a little while." 



XXXII 

VENEZUELA, THE TURBULENT REPUBLIC OF 
THE NORTH 

An Accessible Frontier — Large Resources — Terrible Misrule — The Dis- 
covery of Venezuela — Little Venice— Early Years of Oppression — 
Venezuela's Declaration of Independence — The Career of the Greatest 
Venezuelan — Blanco and Castro— Caracas, the Capital — The Outlook 
for Venezuela. 

VENEZUELA, of all countries in South America, 
is the country for which God has done the most 
and man the least. In fact it is the country in 
which man seems to have done his best to thwart the 
good designs of Providence. Almost any other country, 
subjected to the systematic pillage by which Venezuela 
has been plundered, would long ago have been reduced 
to a primeval wilderness or succumbed to its enemies from 
without. That Venezuela survives at all as an inde- 
pendent republic is proof of her inherent resources and 
recuperative powers. 

Unlike the republics of the west coast she has an easily 
accessible frontier. In Peru and Chile, for thousands of 
miles, barren, inhospitable mountains forbid the traveller 
and merchant to penetrate the interior. Along the 
Venezuelan coast the mountain ramparts are low, and a 
smiling and abundant vegetation invites the explorer to 
penetrate beyond them. Instead of having to scale 
passes three miles high in order to reach the promised 
land beyond, as on the west coast, the passes of the 
Venezuelan coast mountains are scarcely half a mile high. 

263 



264 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

In Amazonian Brazil the impenetrable jungle and the 
malarial swamps are as great an obstacle to the explorer 
as the barren mountains of Peru, but along the Venezuelan 
shore there is little of this difSiculty, and the traveller's 
way is made comparatively easy by nature. When one 
gets beyond the low barriers, he finds great healthy up- 
land prairies of rich soil, furnishing splendid pasturage 
for tens of millions of cattle and sheep. Every tropical 
plant can be grown here, and cofifee and cacapmalone, 
had they been cultivated to their limit, might long ago 
have made Venezuela one of the rich nations of the 
world. 

But in spite of these natural advantages, what do we 
see ? A country ravaged by tyrants from without, and 
wracked by internal dissensions, a country taxed to 
death ; a country of rankly and frankly dishonest 
ofBicials, who have systematically laid up millions for 
themselves while they have robbed the people ; a country 
which in all its long list of rulers can scarcely boast of 
one honest administration. 

In many things Venezuela was the first of South Amer- 
ican countries, — the first to be discovered, the first to de- 
clare itself an independent republic, the first to win 
victories on any considerable scale against Spain. 

On his third voyage, in 1498, Columbus discovered the 
coast of Venezuela south of the "Windward Islands. A 
year later Alonso de Ojeda followed the coast along for 
four hundred miles, without finding any spot where he 
could penetrate the mountain chain which follows the 
shore, though it really presents few diflBculties compared 
with the mountains of the Pacific coast. But when he 
got into the great Gulf of Maracaibo, he saw signs of 
habitation and found that the Indians lived in villages 
where the houses were built on piles driven into the shal- 
low water near the shore. This naturally, suggested to 



VENEZUELA 265 

him tlie Italian city of the Lagoons, and he named the 
place Venezuela, or Little Venice, a name that afterwards 
was given to the whole shore for hundreds of miles, and 
that attached itself to that great republic (great terri- 
torially) that occupies the northeastern corner of South 
America. 

No settlements were made in Venezuela for thirty 
years after Columbus first saw the shore, and it was 
nearly twenty years more before the interior was pene- 
trated, and any permament settlement was made beyond 
the barrier of the mountains. Then followed nearly two 
hundred years of cruel exploitation by the Spaniards, 
who tried to squeeze dry the poor Venezuelan orange 
and theh throw it aside as worthless. 

All that they wanted was gold and silver, and when 
the placer mines were exhausted, they had little further 
use for the great province, larger and richer though it 
was than Spain itself. Commerce was forbidden, as it 
was indeed by this short-sighted government on all the 
South American coast, and ' ' the only goods legally im- 
ported had to be procured from the Cadiz monopoly, and 
were sent to the Isthmus and there transhipped into 
coasting vessels, paying enormous freight charges, profits 
and duties. Tobacco and salt were monopolized by gov- 
ernment concessionaires, and not a chicken could be sold 
in the markets without paying an exorbitant tax. 

' ' Education was completely neglected. It was not until 
1696 that a priests' school was established in Caracas, 
and when the City of Merida asked a similar boon it was 
denied, because 'His Catholic Majesty did not deem it 
wise that education should become general in America.' 
So the Creoles (the native people of Spanish blood) grew 
up nearly as ignorant as the Indians around them, al- 
though retaining all the fierce pride of their Spanish 
descent, acknowledging no man as superior, and retain- 



266 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

ing very dim sentiments of loyalty to the mother coun- 
try." ' 

The first movement for liberty in Venezuela began in 
1806 and was an abortive one, though it was destined to 
have large results. It is interesting to North Americans 
because its leader, Francisco Miranda, a native of Caracas, 
had fought under Washington, and his expedition was 
made up of American filibusters who sailed from New 
York in three ships and attempted to land on Venezuelan 
shores. 

They were beaten, however, and ten ''Yankee" mem- 
bers of the expedition were condemned and shot in Puerto 
Cabello where a monument has recently been erected in 
their honour ; a scarcely deserved honour, since it is not 
plain that they were actuated by any high motives or de- 
sires to promote human rights. Their leader, Miranda, 
escaped to Jamaica and lived to play an important part 
in the future history of Venezuela. He afterwards ap- 
pears as a leader of the patriot forces when the real revo- 
lution that freed Venezuela actually began. 

This was in 1811, when, on the 5th of July, almost ex- 
actly the thirty-fifth anniversary of American inde- 
pendence, Venezuela adopted a similar declaration of 
independence, proclaiming its seven provinces free and 
independent states. This independence was not destined 
to be achieved without a bloody struggle, however. Over 
and over again the patriot forces were defeated, and it 
looked as though the Spanish power had finally tri- 
umphed. Twelve years later, on the 8th of November, 
1823, the last Spanish stronghold was taken, and Vene- 
zuela's long fight for freedom was secured. 

Though Miranda himself did not accomplish great 
things for the independence of Venezuela, one of his 
young lieutenants was destined to imprint his name in- 
' Dawson's "South Anierioan Republics." 



VENEZUELA 267 

delibly on the liistory of South America. This was no 
other than Simon Bolivar, all in all, in spite of his moral 
defects, the greatest character that South America has 
produced, unless it be San Martin, the hero of Argen- 
tina, who so far surpassed Bolivar in self-effacing 
patriotism. 

The story of Bolivar's triumphs has already been told 
in other chapters, for though he was a native of Vene- 
zuela, the scene of his victories was more in Colombia 
and even in Peru and Bolivia than in his native land. 
In fact, he met with his worst defeats in Venezuela, not 
only from the Spanish enemy but from the jealousy and 
distrust of his own countrymen, and he died, discouraged 
and heart-broken, at the early age of forty-seven. His 
hopeless wail upon his resignation of the presidency and 
afterwards upon his death-bed, seems a prophecy of 
the evil years which have come to Venezuela since his 
death. "Independence is the only benefit we have 
achieved and that has been at the cost of all others," he 
wrote. "Our constitutions are books, our laws paper, 
our elections combats, and life itself a torment. We 
shall arrive at such a state that no foreign nation will 
condescend to conquer us, and we shall be governed by 
petty tyrants." 

If Bolivar had known of the administration of Blanco 
and Castro he could not have prophesied more accurately. 
Since the achievement of freedom from Spain, revolution 
has followed revolution, the contest often being between 
the states for supreme power and a weak central govern- 
ment. As in other South American states the so-called 
"Unitarians" and the "Federalists" have nominally 
fought for power, though often the fight has degenerated 
into a mere personal squabble for the spoils of office, 
without a shred of principle to justify the contest, while 
the poor, patient peasantry have been slaughtered like 



268 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

sheep on either side, not knowing or caring for what they 
fought. 

The only strong man who emerged from the welter of 
the conflict for many years was Guzman Blanco. He 
was as bad as he was strong, was constantly feathering 
his own nest and plucking the feathers from the breasts 
of his people, but he at least gave Venezuela a compara- 
tively stable government for nearly twenty years, in the 
'70's and '80's ; reformed the currency, rebuilt and greatly 
beautified Caracas, the capital, and secured to Venezuela 
the only long period for peaceful recuperation she has 
ever enjoyed. 

Another strong man of like character came to the front 
in 1899 in the person of the present President Castro, 
whose administration has aroused the execration of the 
civilized world, and yet who seems to be the only man 
in Venezuela who can control the turbulent forces 
sufficiently to carry on even the semblance of a govern- 
ment. Castro first came into notice by starting an in- 
surrection in the western state of Los Andes. His army 
grew as he marched to Caracas, until at last he was able 
to capture the capital and establish himself in supreme 
power. 

The comparatively recent blockade of Venezuelan 
ports in 1902, and the destruction of the puny Venezuelan 
navy by the joint fleets of England, Germany and Italy, 
will be remembered by my readers. This was to insure 
the long delayed payment of the just claims of citizens 
of these powers. Serious international complications 
were likely to arise, and the United States persuaded 
Venezuela and the Powers to submit these claims to 
arbitration, a matter which was one of the first to occupy 
the attention of the Hague Tribunal. 

President Castro was elected by congress (it may be 
more truthful to say, by the bayonets of his soldiers) to 



VENEZUELA 269 

serve for six years from 1902, and what may still happen 
before his term of ofice expires, or afterwards, no 
prophet would be bold enough to predict. It would 
seem, however, that nothing worse for poor Venezuela 
than what she has endured, could be in store for her. 

In many respects Venezuela shares the characteristics 
of other South American countries. Her people are 
even more cosmopolitan than in most of the other coun- 
tries of the southern continent, and every shade of colour 
is seen, and every language is heard in the streets of 
Caracas, though of course Spanish is the dominant 
tongue. 

The city of Caracas, as seen from a distance, is a 
beautiful one, and certainly occupies a unique situation. 
Built on the old bed of a prehistoric lake, it is surrounded 
by mountains nine thousand feet high, while the approach 
to it is by a wonderful mountain railway over a pass 
nearly a mile above the sea level. On nearer approach 
the city does not make good the anticipation of the dis- 
tant view, for one sees that the houses and public build- 
ings are, many of them, shabby in appearance, and the 
streets are poorly paved, and full of pitfalls for horses 
and foot-passengers. The city contains a fine cathedral, 
a university and a Pantheon of national heroes, while 
the great statue of Venezuela's chief hero, Bolivar, 
which stands in the principal plaza, is indeed a work of 
art. Some of the houses, too, though looking shabby 
outside, are beautiful within, with lovely patios where 
flowers bloom and birds sing, and cool water from artistic 
fountains tinkles down upon tesselated pavements. 

The common people of course have no such luxuries, 
and live usually in very squalid style, with dirt floors 
tinder their feet und dirt on everything that their hands 
touch. 

The liquor saloons which abound everywhere sport 



270 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

such signs as ''The Fountain of Hope," "God's Good 
Grace," and, judging from the number of shrines and 
crosses and pictures of the saints and the Virgin that are 
displayed, the people would seem to be very religious. 
But it is an exceedingly superficial religion, which seems 
to have little influence on life and conduct, and nowhere 
are Protestant churches, schools and other institutions 
more needed than in Venezuela. It is gratifying to 
know that, though missionary work is yet in its infancy 
in this republic, a good beginning has been made. 

The outlook for Venezuela is not of the brightest by 
any means, but we can only hope that she is in one of the 
earlier and darker stages of the struggle for liberty and 
a stable government, through which all of the South 
American republics have passed and out of which some 
of them have already emerged into the sunlight of pros- 
perity and an assured and well-defined freedom. 

May this be the happy fate of Venezuela and may her 
future be as peaceful as her past has been turbulent ! 



xxxni 

THE THREE GUIANAS 

The Only Monarchical Section of South America— The Republican Idea- 
Extent and Population of the Guianas — A Checkered History — Co- 
lumbus and Sir "Walter Raleigh — The British and the Dutch— A 
Disastrous Exchange for Holland — Brave Moravian Missionaries — 
French Guiana— Sugar-cane Behind the Dikes — Uneventful Peace. 

THE only territory in South America which does 
not belong to one of the eleven self-governing 
republics, is the comparatively small strip on 
the northeastern coast, which is divided between Great 
Britain, Holland and France, and is known as British, 
Dutch and French Guiana, and the bleak, wind-swept 
Falkland islands off the coast of Argentina. 

While nearly one-half of North America is under the 
dominion of a European crown. South America is almost 
entirely republican in its government, — the only conti- 
nent of which this can be said. It is to be feared that 
many parts of South America have not commended the 
republican form of government to the rest of the world, 
and several of the republics have doubtless served as 
"dreadful examples" of popular misrule, which have 
joyfully been pointed to by monarchists in all parts of 
the world. 

But if South America has not added much lustre to the 
republican idea, this idea has certainly taken deep root 
on her soil, and there is almost no likelihood that a 
monarchy will ever gain a further foothold in the con- 
tinent. Even without the Monroe Doctrine in force this 
would be impossible since the people seem thoroughly 

271 



272 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

wedded to the repubUcau principles, faulty as they are 
in practice in many of the states. 

Instead of three Guianas, we might properly speak of 
five, for the territory to which an old Indian tribe gave 
this name really embraces part of Venezuela and part of 
Brazil as well as the country that belongs to the English, 
Dutch and French. It is really a vast island, bounded 
by the Atlantic Ocean, the Amazon, Eio Negro, Cassi- 
quiare and Orinoco Elvers. Though the water boun- 
daries are narrow in some places, yet the similitude of an 
island is carried out on a great scale, when we remember 
that this mass of high plateaus is separated from the 
other mountainous portions of South America by vast 
river valleys, which practically cut it off and isolate it 
more completely than would the waters of the ocean. 

The Guianas in this more extended sense, embrace 
eight hundred thousand square miles, equal to more than 
a quarter part of the continental territory of the United 
States, and the rivers which wash their shores, like the 
Amazon and the Orinoco, are among the largest in the 
world. The population of the Guianas, on account of 
the hot and unhealthful clrmate near the shore and along 
the river valleys, is comparatively small. But a little 
over half a million people inhabit this vast territory. 
Every man, woman and child could possess nearly two 
square miles, if the country was evenly parcelled out 
among all the people. As a matter of fact, however, 
more than half of the half million are gathered in a 
small part of British Guiana, which is by far the most 
important of them all. The population is largely com- 
posed of black people, and formerly great colonies of 
negroes who had fled from their masters settled in the 
interior of the Guianas and became a terror to all other 
settlers. 

The history of this strip of South American coast is 



THE THEEE GUIANAS 273 

not without an interest of its own. It was one of tlie very 
first parts of the New World seen by a white man. Only 
seven years after his first memorable voyage, Columbus 
sighted the coast of Guiana, but he apparently did noth- 
ing more than look upon it from the ship's deck, and in 
this he showed his wisdom, for thousands of future and 
more rash explorers paid for their temerity with their 
lives, and found their graves in Guiana. 

In 1595 Sir Walter Ealeigh tried to penetrate into the 
interior, thinking that the new El Dorado was there. 
But he found nothing but malaria and disease, and 
rightly concluded that it was the last place in which to 
look for an El Dorado. The Dutch were the first actual 
settlers, and in 1581 they formed a feeble colony upon 
the part of the coast which is now British Guiana. It is 
a singular fact that the Dutch first settled British Guiana, 
and the British first settled Dutch Guiana. All these 
little colonies have had their ups and downs, and have 
been under more than one flag. 

In 1596 the Dutch were driven out by the Spaniards ; 
exactly two hundred years later the colonies were taken 
by the British. They were given up in 1802, retaken by 
the British in 1803, and held by them ever since. This, 
as I have said, is by far the best part of Guiana. Its 
population is probably over 300,000, of whom over 100,- 
000 are East Indians, who make their way wherever the 
British flag flies, and seem to thrive as well in South 
Africa or South America, as they do in their own land. 
Another 100,000 of the people or more are negroes, and 
there are many of mixed breeds. 

That suffrage is not enjoyed to any great extent by the 
people is proved by the fact that a few years ago there 
were only two thousand voters among the three hundred 
thousand people. 

The capital of British Guiana is Georgetown, and is a 



274 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

coinparately modern and thriving city, with a very con- 
siderable trade. The fact that two million dollars' worth 
of gold are mined in British Guiana make it a settlement 
of no little importance, while its trade in sugar-cane, 
coffee, cocoa, etc., is very considerable. 

We all remember the war-cloud that suddenly arose 
on the American horizon a few years ago when President 
Cleveland's peremptory note demanded that the British 
claims to Venezuelan territory in the Guianas be at ojice 
adjusted on a reasonable basis. Probably no act of 
Cleveland's administration or of any recent president has 
been more loudly condemned or more warmly applauded 
both at home and abroad than this. It is perhaps as yet 
too soon to decide upon its wisdom, but it is certain that 
Great Britain preferred arbitration to the risk of war 
over a comparatively worthless and inaccessible bit of 
territory, and she yielded gracefully to President Cleve- 
land's demands. 

Venezuela has since proved to be so untrustworthy in 
her negotiations with other countries and the bombastic 
president, Castro, has so thoroughly acted out the part of 
the naughty boy among the South American presidents, 
that many people of the United States would have been 
glad if President Cleveland had let Great Britain have 
her own way unhampered by any threats of enforcement 
of the Monroe Doctrine, feeling that the Venezuelan 
Guianas would be much better off under the Union Jack 
than under the unstable banner of Venezuela. 

Dutch Guiana, as I have said, was first settled by the 
English, and received the name of Surrey-ham. This 
was afterwards corrupted into Surinam, by which name 
it is often known. The most interesting item in its his- 
tory, to North Americans, is the fact that in 1667 by the 
Peace of Breda, it was given to the British in exchange 
for the New Netherlands, otherwise New York. It could 



THE THEEE GUIANAS 275 

hardly be said in the light of subsequent events that this 
was the fair exchange which is no robbery. The New 
Netherlands now has a population of nearly eight mil- 
lions; poor old Dutch Guiana has less than a hundred 
thousand people. The New Netherlands contain the 
second city of the world. Paramaribo, the capital of 
British Guiana, has hardly as many thousands as New 
York has millions. The New Netherlands has become 
the empire state of the New World. The territory for 
which it was exchanged has hardly shared to any extent 
the prosperity of modern nations. 

But though Holland obtained this part of Guiana in 
1667, at such an enormous price, as it afterwards proved, 
she was not allowed to hold it in peace and quiet. For 
it was captured by the British in 1779, given back to the 
Dutch in 1802, held by the British once more for twelve 
years, from 1804 to 1816, and finally restored to the Dutch 
by the Peace of Paris in the latter year. 

Here the Moravian missionaries established one of their 
early missions. Long before modern missions became 
popular in the other Protestant churches, the brave 
Moravians sought out the most difficult and disease- 
wasted corners of the world. This was one of them, and 
here in 1739 they established themselves and sought to 
bring the natives to a knowledge of God. In the previous 
year they began their work in British Guiana, and to-day 
they number more than eight thousand communicants, 
and as many more adherents in these colonies, with thou- 
sands of pupils in their schools. In fact, at the beginning 
of this century, there were twice as many communicants 
in the Moravian church as in any one missionary society 
in South America. 

French Guiana is the poorest and most hopeless foreign 
possession in South America. It is frequently called 
Cayenne from the name of its capital, and the name sug- 



276 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

gests the hot country which seems to fully live up to its 
title. Among the few thousands of inhabitants there were, 
a short time ago, nearly five thousand ticket-of-leave con- 
victs, since, for a long time, France sent her criminals to 
these shores. But the climate was so bad for white col- 
onists that a generation ago she began to send them else- 
where ; and the inhabitants of French Guiana are now al- 
most entirely Indians or negroes. Like the other Guianas, 
the French colony has suffered much from war as well as 
disease. It has been ravaged and abandoned by the Eng- 
lish and Dutch alike, and was not finally restored to 
France by the British until a century ago. In 1763 
France made a desperate effort to colonize this country, 
in order that she might gain a foothold in South America. 
In that year she sent out no less than fifteen thousand 
colonists, but in two years thirteen thousand of them had 
found graves in the new land, and only two thousand dis- 
couraged and hopeless men and women were left. 

In some respects the three Guianas have an important 
place to fill among the minor colonies of the world. No 
land is better adapted to the cultivation of the sugar-cane 
than that along the shores of these countries, and the 
Dutch, with characteristic courage and determination, 
having learned how to do it in their own low-land, built 
dikes and walls, and recovered large sections of land from 
the sea, land which is of apparently inexhaustible fertility 
in the production of sugar-cane. 

These colonies may well congratulate themselves that 
for a hundred years, at least, they have lived in peace. 
While the countries all around them have been distracted 
by foreign wars and drenched in the blood of their own 
citizens, the Guianas have had little to break the serene 
monotony of their existence. If they have not progressed 
very rapidly, they certainly have not retrograded ; if they 
have not made any startling progress, they at least de- 



THE THREE GUIANAS 277 

serve the encomium of the happy nations that have made 
no history. Doubtless as other and more attractive por- 
tions of the world are filled with adventurous settlers, 
these colonies will attract their quota, and will have a 
more prosperous, though perhaps a less exciting history, 
than in the early years of their settlement by European 
powers. 



WITH THE PRESIDENTS OF FOUR REPUBLICS 

Doctor Amador — His Appearance and His Family — The Senate Chamber 
of Peru — An Ingenious Way of Balloting — President Pardo — The 
Palace in Lima — Section 4 of the Constitution — The Constitution and 
the Temper of the People of Peru — President Montt of Chile — ^A 
Democratic Executive— President Alcorta of Argentina — Favourable 
Impressions. 

IT is always interesting to meet the rulers of a people ; 
for they are very sure, whatever their character or 
abilities, to be typical men, typical of their times 
and country, typical at least of the party which brought 
them into power. On this account I have taken pains in 
some of the republics I have visited, to have an interview 
with their chief executives, a courtesy which has been 
readily granted. 

The president of the Eepublic of Panama is His Excel- 
lency, Doctor Amador. He is a physician by profession 
and a politician only by accident, as it were ; for the 
recent cotip d'etat of Panama, in shaking off her entang- 
ling alliance with Colombia in order that the canal might 
be dug, resulted in Dr. Amador's election to be the first 
president of the republic, an honour of which he probably 
never dreamed five years ago. 

He was not a young man, and very likely he would 
have preferred to remain in his chosen profession ; but he 
responded to the call of his country and has made a safe 
and patriotic, though not a brilliant, president. He lives 
in a modest house near the centre of the city of Panama, 
a house whose hallway is bright with the plants and 
flowers which he loves. A new palace is being built, 
which will quite eclipse his present residence. 

278 



THE PEESIDEKTS OF FOtJU EEPUBLICS 279 

He received me most graciously, chatted in excellent 
English about his own country and mine, and the great 
canal, in which he has the utmost faith, as well he may 
have. He has a piercing black eye, an eager, almost ap- 
pealing look, and came to the door to meet me with out- 
stretched hand in a cordial and democratic manner. 

He belongs to one of the oldest and best families of 
Panama, and in his hands, so far as he can guide its des- 
tinies, I believe the interests of the small but important 
republic of the Isthmus are safe. 

Peru is a republic of a different type, larger, richer, 
more populous in the proportion of ten to one, perhaps ; 
a country with a great and troubled history, but let us 
hope with a greater and more peaceful future. 

A call on her chief magistrate was most interesting. 
To see the successor of Atahuallpa, Huascar, and Pizarro, 
and a long line of rulers, Incas, and Spaniards and 
Creoles ; rulers worthy and unworthy ; rulers progressive, 
reactionary, mercenary, and patriotic, is of itself inter- 
esting ; and to find one of the best of the long line in the 
chair of state to-day is still more gratifying. 

Before going to the palace I had the pleasure of visit- 
ing the Senate chamber of Peru, where the upper house 
of the republic holds its deliberations. It is a beautiful 
room in the old Hall of the Inquisition, where, in the 
bloody days of old, edicts went forth condemning to death 
and torture Jews, Protestants, and all other heretics who 
did not accept the Catholic faith. An attempt has been 
made to change the name of this great building and the 
plaza on which it faces, but the unsavory old name still 
sticks to it. The Senate chamber itself is a beautiful 
room with a remarkable ceiling of wood, elaborately 
carved, that also dates back to the Inquisition. 

A most ingenious way for balloting is provided in the 
Peruvian Senate, and one which I never saw in any other 



280 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

deliberative assembly. Behind the speaker's chair are 
fifty-six round glass disks about as large as the palm of 
one's hand, each one corresponding to some senator's 
chair. When a vote is to be taken, each senator presses 
one of two buttons under his desk, and an electric light 
is switched on to one of the disks. A white light indi- 
cates a yea vote ; a red light, a nay vote. In a moment 
the vote is taken ; in another moment it can be counted 
and recorded. 

As it is difficult to find out or to remember which disks 
correspond to the respective seats, the ballot is practically 
a secret one and no senator need be intimidated by hav- 
ing his vote known by his constituents. Such a method 
has its advantages, and its very obvious disadvantages, 
for it is difBLcult to put a slippery senator on record with 
such a method of voting. 

The only large picture in the Senate chamber that I re- 
member is that of Don Manuel Pardo, Peru's first civilian 
president, who came into power in the early seventies. 
His predecessors had been military dictators, many of 
them bent on personal aggrandizement and autocratic 
power. 

President Pardo was constitutionally elected, but his 
administration fell on troublous times. • ' His four years, ' ' 
says the historian, "were one continual struggle against 
impending bankruptcy. Though he brought some order 
into public accounts, it was only by all sorts of expedients 
that he managed to keep up interest payments. . . . 
His intellectual and moral force united about him the 
educated and property-holding classes in a party which 
survives to this day, and he left the reputation of having 
been the best president who ever ruled Peru."^ 

The son of this able and upright statesman is the 

^T. C. Dawson in " The South American Republics." 



THE PEESIDENTS OP FOUE EEPUBLICS 281 

present president of the republic, and he it was whom I 
went to see immediately after visiting the Senate house 
where his honoured father's portrait ornaments the wall. 
The president lives in a beautiful private residence of his 
own on one of the chief streets of Lima, but he received 
me at the " Palace," his official residence, which fronts 
on the fine plaza of Lima, on another side of which is the 
great Cathedral where Pizarro's bones lie. 

The palace is an enormous building erected by Pizarro 
on this very spot, though doubtless much altered since 
his day. It is long and low, and is guarded at every en- 
trance by a formidable array of soldiers. 

The interview was arranged for me by Hon. Eichard 
E. Neill, the charge d'affaires, who was the acting minister 
of the United States in the absence of the new minister 
who had not then arrived. It would be difficult to find 
one better suited to the position he holds than is Mr. 
Neill ; genial, popular with all classes, unwearying in his 
kindness to friends and visitors. While ministers have 
come and ministers have gone, Mr. Neill has remained in 
Lima for a score of years or more, the one indispensable 
man in the legation. 

First, Mr. ISTeill took me to see the secretary of foreign 
affairs. Dr. V. Polo, a youngish man of much ability, 
who speaks excellent English, and converses with great 
intelligence about things Peruvian and American. 

After a fe^ minutes' conversation with him we were 
turned over to the president's aide-de-camp, a gorgeously 
dressed individual of huge proportions, who conducted 
us through one handsome and richly upholstered salon 
after another until we came to the president's reception- 
room. On the wall of this room, as also in one or two 
other rooms of the palace, I noticed an oil painting of 
President Castilla, that rugged old military president of 
Peru, who kept his hands on the reins of power for nearly 



282 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

twenty years, and who, by rough and ready means suited 
to the times, brought order out of chaos, au order which 
unfortunately relapsed into chaos again ere long. 

After we had waited in this room a very few minutes, 
a young man with a pleasant face, and modestly dressed 
in civilian's clothes, came into the room, and greeted us 
all quietly but cordially. This was His Excellency, 
D. Jose Pardo, President of the Eepublic of Peru. 

His voice is low and melodious and his face expressive, 
and, though he speaks no English, and I no Spanish, 
we got on very well through my kind interpreters, 
Hon. E. E. Neill and Eev. J. S. Watson. 

After Mr. Watson had explained the object and extent 
of the Christian Endeavour movement. President Pardo 
asked whether it was a Catholic movement. 

''No," answered Mr. Neill diplomatically, "it is 
just Christian." 

"Then," said the president to me with a twinkle in his 
eye, "we shall have to apply Section 4 of the Constitu- 
tion to you," at which the others smiled audibly ; for they 
understood, as I did not, that Section 4 was the article of 
the Constitution which forbids the propaganda of any re- 
ligion except the Eoman Catholic. 

However, we all saw that the president was not very 
serious, and he went on to say to me, "The spirit of the 
people of Peru is very tolerant, though the Constitution 
is very intolerant." 

This expresses the truth, I am told, about Peru, very 
happily. The Constitution promulgated in 1860 is still 
in force, and this forbids Peruvians to embrace any re- 
ligion but the Eoman Catholic. But, while the Constitu- 
tion remains the same, the spirit of the people and 
the spirit of the times have changed, and Protestant 
workers meet with little opposition in the centres of 
population. 



THE PEESIDENTS OF FOUE EEPUBLICS 283 

Theoretically they still meet in private houses, and 
not in public churches ; but practically they have 
much liberty, as the Protestant work that is carried on 
in Peru, both educational and evangelistic, distinctly 
testifies. 

After a little further conversation with the president 
on general subjects, a conversation in which he expressed 
his high regard for the American people and our own 
honoured president, the interview came to an end, and I 
left the palace feeling that all I had heard to the credit of 
the president of Peru from foreigners and natives, mis- 
sionaries and merchants alike, was true, and that the ex- 
ecutive of the nation was an ef&cient, forceful, modest, 
unassuming gentleman ; and that is no small thing to say 
of any man, be he in high position or low. 

The president of the rival republic of Chile is a very 
different man in appearance from the President of Peru ; 
an older man, a man with deeper furrows in his brows, 
and of a more anxious, care-worn expression ; and well 
he may be, for his administration has not been an un- 
troubled one. His foes have been largely those of his 
own household, and he has found it a diflScult task to 
make the different departments of the Chilian national 
government pull together in a way which in his opinion 
insures the welfare of the people. 

Still his face is one of force and native dignity, and on 
all hands I heard only good things concerning his per- 
sonal integrity, and his genuine patriotism. It takes a 
man of remarkable strength and popularity to carry the 
governmental ship of Chile through the breakers safely just 
at this time. Perhaps no one could do it better than 
President Montt, and after seeing him, I could not but 
congratulate the country on having a man of such serious- 
ness of purpose and devoted earnestness at the head of 
affairs just now. He is the son of one of Chile's greatest 



284 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

presidents, and looks not unlike President Diaz of Mexico. 
His swarthy face, like that of Mexico's president, declares 
his partial Indian descent. His official residence is the 
palace of Santiago, which though a large and stately edi- 
fice, has about it a certain republican simplicity of style 
appropriate to the century and the country where the 
chief magistrate lives. 

There were few guards, and little pomp or circumstance 
about the president's reception of us. He came into the 
room entirely unattended, and greeted my companions 
and myself in a most friendly and democratic manner. 

He told me of his interest in the undeveloped races 
of his own land, and his desire that the great curse of the 
aboriginal races, the strong fire water of the whites, might 
be kept away from them. President Montt is cartooned 
outrageously in the Chilean papers of the yellow type, 
and during my visit one of them appeared with a blas- 
phemous cartoon of the Eepublic of Chile, being crucified 
between two thieves, — the present president and his 
predecessor. But all good men must expect such treat- 
ment at the hands of ribald yellow journals like this, and 
it is an undoubted fact that the honest men of Chile speak 
well of their honest president, even when they do not 
agree with his politics. 

The President of Argentina is a younger man than 
President Montt ; somewhat dapper, though not dandified, 
he has the reputation of appreciating and maintaining the 
dignity which doth hedge a president. 

His cabinet and councillors, some of whom I met, are 
more easy in their manners than the president, who, how- 
ever, does not lack in dignity, and a pleasant address. 
Sefior Alcorta came into power as did President Eoose- 
velt at first, on the decease of the former president, who 
died early in his term of office, and with whom he had 



THE PEESIDENTS OF FOUE EEPUBLICS 285 

been serving as vice-president of the republic. I was ac- 
companied by Hon. A. M. Beaupre, our American min- 
ister, and by Dr. Drees, the Presiding Elder of the Meth- 
odist church, who has the reputation of being the best in- 
terpreter in Argentina. He translated what I had to say 
to the president, who speaks no English, and he put my 
questions and remarks into such elegant and courtly 
Spanish, that however much of a stickler for etiquette the 
president may be (thanks to Dr. Drees), he could find no 
fault with the interview. He too assured me that he was 
especially interested in civilizing and Christianizing the 
Indians in the remote parts of Argentina, and that for this 
provision was made even in the constitution of the 
country. 

The palace which contains the government offices of 
Argentina is an imposing building fronting on the beautiful 
Plaza de Mayo, and all the surroundings of the Govern- 
ment House, are worthy of the prosperous Eepublic of 
which it is the governmental heart and head. 

These visits to the presidents of these four republics, 
and other high dignitaries whom I met at various times 
and in these and other countries, made upon me the im- 
pression that however much the subordinate officials of the 
South American republics may deserve their reputation 
for graft and dishonesty, this rottenness does not reach to 
the higher places in the government any more than in 
our own country, that those who rule the affairs of the 
leading republics of South America at least, are honest 
men and true patriots, and that their example will make 
for a higher grade of citizenship than these republics have 
known in their troublous past. 



XXXV 

HOW WE JOURNEYED 

A Pullman Train or an Oxcart — Travelling in Colombia and Ecuador — 
Peruvian Railways — Improvements in Chile and Argentina — The 
American Style Adopted— High Fares— Street-Car Travel — An Elec- 
tric Car Lottery — Carriages in Santiago and Rio — Lifts for High 
Levels — Steamer Travel — Exorbitant Charges on Steamers — Over- 
crowding — Genial Officers — The Longest, Quiclcest Way Home. 

THEEE are few people who are not interested in 
the means of locomotion in a land they have 
not visited. Those who expect to travel there, 
wish to know how they will get from place to place, while 
stay-at-homes are interested to know how travellers fare. 
As an indication of advancement, too, there are few surer 
signs than the means of travel, for civilization is largely 
a matter of intercommunication. 

When we come to describe the means of travel in South 
America, however, it is something like describing the 
weather of the United States. There you can have sun- 
shine and storm, sweltering heat and an arctic blizzard 
on the same day. So in South America, you can go on 
foot, on mule back, in a Pullman palace train, on an ox- 
cart with fourteenth century wheels, or on a modern ten 
thousand ton steamer, according to the part of the coun- 
try you may wish to visit. 

But a few facts, gleaned largely from experience in the 
different South American countries, will perhaps be found 
of interest. 

In Colombia, railways are few and walking is not good, 
but mules are sturdy and the abundant water ways give 
some help to travellers in the interior. It takes, how- 

286 



HOW WE JOUENEYED 287 

ever, nearly a week to reacli Caracas, the capital, from 
the coast, by the fastest means at the disposal of the trav- 
eller, which for the most of the way is the patient mule. 
This mode of travel, much the same as in Abraham's 
day, still prevails in many parts of South America. 

In Ecuador railways are being pushed more rapidly, 
and from Guayaquil, the seaport, one could get within 
seventy-five miles of Quito, the capital, by rail, and the 
rest of the way by automobile, early in 1907. Very soon 
the whole distance can be covered by rail ; but elsewhere 
in this republic travel is, and long will be, by river boat 
or on mule back. 

In Peru a number of short railways run from the sea- 
coast up the river valleys to bring down their rich 
products to the sea, two lines are built to the great cop- 
per mines of the interior. Of these, the Oroya road that 
runs from Lima to the Oerro de Pasco mines is one of the 
marvels of engineering, especially when we remember that 
it was built forty years' ago. At the time, nothing so 
bold had been attempted, in the Alps or the Eockies, and 
to this day it is the highest railway in the world, crossing 
the Andes at a height of more than 16,000 feet, or con- 
siderably higher than the summit of Mt. Blanc. 

From Mollendo on the coast south of Lima, another 
Peruvian railway runs some 300 miles to Lake Titicaca, 
and crosses the Andes at a height of over 14,000 feet. 
The engineering difBculties are not so great on this line, 
but still they are sufficient to stagger any but the most 
bold and courageous railway builders. 

The road-bed on both of these lines is fairly good, but 
the rails are light and the equipment poor. On the line 
from Mollendo, in fact, the cars are so shaky, especially 
on the part beyond Arequipa, that it seems as if they 
would hardly hold together to the journey's end, and in a 
heavy shower they leak at every crack in the roof. 



288 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

In Chile the cars are much better, and on the line from 
Valparaiso to Santiago and thence to Coucepcion, and 
the one to Los Andes in the mountains, compare favour- 
ably with the rolling stock on our best American roads. 

In Argentina, too, they are of the same substantial 
character, and the great transcontinental line across the 
pampas is quite equal to the average railway of the 
United States in construction and equipment. The sleep- 
ing cars, however, could be much improved, for though 
the berths are wide and roomy, the cars are not well 
constructed, and the single windows let in the fine dust 
of the pampas so that the cars become intolerably dirty 
before the twenty-four hours' journey is over. 

In Uruguay the railway equipment is much the same 
as in Argentina, and considering the size of the country 
it has a large railway mileage. 

In Brazil railway extension has advanced rapidly of 
late, and the iron horse is pushing his way far into the 
interior. Some of the railways are narrow guage, but 
most of them are of standard guage with cars and engines 
much like those we are accustomed to in the United 
States. In fact most of the equipment of South Amer- 
ican roads comes from ^'the States," and the names of 
Philadelphia, Wilmington and Worcester makers one 
sees everywhere on the high Andes of the west coast, the 
great plateaus of Peru and Bolivia, and the vast alluvial 
plains of the south. 

The American as distinct from the European style 
of compartment coaches has been adopted in all these 
countries, and people crowd together democratically in 
the same car to the number of forty or fifty, as with us. 
Sometimes there is a division in the middle of the car, 
and occasionally a small section of the car at one end is 
partitioned off for the men smokers, but, in most coun- 
tries, every car and every part of every car is a smoking car. 



HOW WE JOUENEYED 289 

The caste provocative system of first and second class 
prevails in most of the republics, though they do not 
descend to third- and fourth-class cars as in monarchical 
lands. 

The fares, except in Chile, are considerably higher 
than in the United States for first-class passengers^ — in 
fact about twice as high, while second-class passengers 
pay about the same as the ordinary first-class fares in the 
older section of the United States. 

The sleeping car rates are exceedingly high, being 
about six dollars in gold per night for a single berth in 
Brazil. They are not quite so high in Argentina, the 
only other country where sleeping cars are extensively 
used. In some of the republics no passenger trains run 
at night. 

Street car travel has received a great impetus of late 
by the general introduction of the electric trolley into the 
larger cities. A few years ago, every wheel in the streets 
of South America was turned by the horse or the sturdy 
mule. Even in such cities as Buenos Ayres and Santiago 
there was no other cheap means of transit except the 
primitive "foot and walkers" express which has always 
been in vogue. The slow iand halting mule cars ambled 
through all the best streets, the driver blowing a cow horn 
at every street crossing, a needless warning, it would seem, 
since he could scarcely run over anything even if he tried. 
Whenever a passenger held up his hand, he would stop, 
and people would not move ten feet for the sake of 
saving a stop. 

Now in the larger cities, American electric cars go 
whizzing through the streets at what seems a most reck- 
less rate, stopping only at the white posts, as in our 
cities. Indeed, so fast and murderous are some of the cars 
in Eio, which are painted a lemon colour, that they are 
called the ' '■ yellow peril ' ' by the humorous Fluminensians. 



290 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

To be sure, the mule car lingers in many of the streets 
of Eio still, as well as in Montevideo, and in most of the 
smaller cities, but the mule is rapidly being displaced and 
soon the streets that knew him will know him no more. 

The Light and Power Company, composed of American 
capitalists, is one of the two concerns which has revolu- 
tionized the street traffic of South America. Another 
similar company is capitalized largely in Brazil while 
the former is incorporated in Toronto and employs both 
Canadian and United States capital. Both are exceed- 
ingly successful and greatly appreciated by the South 
Americans. 

The fares on the street cars are much the same as in 
North America, averaging about five cents in gold for an 
ordinary ride. In Valparaiso, however, the fare is but 
five cents in Chilean paper money or a cent and a quarter 
in gold, a ruinously low rate, one would think. 

In Lima and some other cities, as has been stated, the 
street car companies have organized a lottery to circum- 
vent dishonest conductors and every ticket is numbered 
and stands a remote chance of drawing a prize. The 
chance is not so remote, however, as to prevent the pas- 
sengers from taking and preserving their tickets in the 
hope of securing the prize and thus preventing the ticket 
puncher from selling it over again. In Eio de Janeiro the 
tickets are redeemed at one per cent, of their value. The 
ordinary fare on the electric cars is 200 reis (about six 
cents), though some tickets cost 300 and 400 reis, accord- 
ing to distance. When taken to the office of the company, 
they are redeemed for two, three or four reis, according 
to their face value. 

The cabs in South America are of almost a^ many 
varieties as the cities in which they ply, though the vic- 
toria, such as is used in Paris, Eome and other conti- 
nental cities, is the most usual type, 



HOW WE JOUENEYED 291 

In Santiago a peculiar, lumbering, funereal type of car- 
riage is used, but it is strong and serviceable on the 
rough pavements which abound in the outskirts of the 
city. 

In Eio, besides the two-horse carriage, the one horse 
Tillbury (named after the English inventor) abounds. 
It is exactly like the old New England chaise, the deacon's 
"one horse shay" which Oliver Wendell Holmes has 
immortalized. It seats only one person besides the driver, 
so that if a man and his wife wish to ride, they must take 
two Tillburys. The driver sits beside his passenger in 
democratic equality, but it is a very expensive mode of 
locomotion, and when it comes to taking a two-horse car- 
riage, most people prefer to walk, as it is a common say- 
ing that it is cheaper to buy the rig outright than to 
hire it. 

The Tillbury was probably introduced into Eio for the 
same reason that it was once used in New England, be- 
cause the heavy springs make the inevitable bumps and 
jounces of the poor roads less intolerable. Now, however, 
that Eio is being repaved with asphalt, in its principal 
streets, the Tillbury will doubtless soon go into limbo. 

There are as yet no elevated roads or subways in South 
American cities, though the congested streets of Buenos 
Ayres would make them most desirable in that city. ' In 
no other city are the streets sufficiently crowded to call 
for them as yet. Eio de Janeiro is nearly as large as 
Buenos Ayres, to be sure, but the city is so spread out 
around the beautiful bay that no one street is as crowded 
as the Avenue de Mayo or the streets of San Martin or 
25th de Mayo in Buenos Ayres. 

Several South American cities rise steeply from the sea 
with but little building ground except on the upper bluffs. 
Valparaiso is notably one of these cities, and in order 
that the people may get from the lower city to the upper 



292 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

without too much leg weariness, ten elevators or rack and 
pinion lifts have been built at various points, where for 
five cents one can mount to the upper levels. 

Bahia is another such city where the upper and lower 
towns are connected by two inclined plane railways, and 
one new American '■'■ lift" which is justly prized by the 
inhabitants. 

When one comes to steamer accommodations, both 
coastwise and over-sea steamers, much is left to be de- 
sired. On the west coast the steamers are slow, unre- 
liable, and often worn out, by much hard service. There 
are two principal passenger lines, the Pacific Steam Navi- 
gation Company and the Sud Americana, or Chilean line. 
These lines have pooled their issues, and tickets on either 
of them are interchangeable. They are equally poor and 
equally slow and equally expensive. The only good 
thing about them is the large and airy staterooms which 
all open on the quarter deck. They are well furnished 
and the berths are unusually large and comfortable. 

The chief officers, too, who are English or Scotch, on 
both lines, are gentlemanly and intelligent and know 
their business. When this has been admitted, all that is 
to the credit of the companies has been said. The table 
is poor and the food monotonous and ill-cooked. It is 
all in Spanish style, which perhaps is natural enough, 
since nine-tenths of the passengers speak the language of 
the Castilians. 

The stops seem innumerable. As a matter of fact 
there are some twenty-three ports between Panama and 
Valparaiso, at which the steamers stop from four hours 
to three days, so that it takes usually twenty-six days to 
cover a distance no longer than from New York to Liver- 
pool. The fares on these lines, too, are abnormally high, 
as I have remarked in another chapter. From Panama 
to Guayaquil, a distance of about 800 miles, the fare is 



HOW WE JOURNEYED 293 

over $90 in gold, wMle a ticket to Valparaiso, some 3,000 
miles from Panama, costs $225 or three times what the 
same accommodations would cost across the North 
Atlantic. 

But the worst count against these steamers is the way 
they are crowded with passengers and the unsafe condi- 
tion of the ships. From Iquique to Valparaiso the 
steamer on which I was embarked, carried at least twice 
as many passengers as she should have been allowed to 
take. Passengers were sleeping in the companionway, 
the dining-room, the bath rooms, as well as on deck. If 
there had been a shipwreck there would have been a 
frightful loss of life, as there were not boats enough for a 
third of the passengers. As it was, an accident was 
barely averted, for the worn-out pumps refused to work, 
the boilers began to leak and the steering gear went 
wrong. For a large part of one day we could make but 
five miles an hour, and it seemed a special interposition 
of Providence that we got safely to port with our great 
crowd of passengers. Then the old ship was tinkered up 
in the dry dock, and soon sent off on another perilous 
voyage. A German line is doing a good business on this 
coast, but there is surely room for a first-class fleet of 
steamers that will make the 3,000 miles between Panama 
and Valparaiso in twelve or fourteen days. The opening 
of the Panama Canal will doubtless hasten this consum- 
mation, so devoutlv to be wished. 

On the Atlantic side of South America, conditions of 
travel are much better, for more lines are in competition, 
but even there they lag far behind the North American 
lines. The Eoyal Mail and the Pacific Steam Navigation 
Company each have two or three good modern steamers 
of some 9,000 or 10,000 tons burden each, but the older 
steamers are decidedly second rate and in the popular 
season for travel are greatly over-crowded. The steerage 



-294 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

accommodations of some of these older ships are dis- 
graceful and filthy beyond description. 

On all the steamers, and I have travelled on seven or 
eight of them, I have found the officers gentlemanly as 
well as ef&cient, a decided contrast to some of their 
brother officers on the North Atlantic service. The per- 
sonnel of the officers alone makes travel on some of these 
steamers reasonably pleasant. 

Besides these two English lines there are two French 
lines, one Spanish, two German and one or two Italian 
lines, while the New Zealand service of the "White Star 
Line touches at some South American ports. 

The only regular line that runs directly to North 
America is the Lamport and Holt, a British company, 
which sends a small but comfortable express steamer 
once a month from Eio to New York, and an intermediate 
boat also monthly, with very limited passenger accommo- 
dations. So that practically unless one is prepared to 
wait a month for his steamer in order to get from South 
America to North America he must cross to Southampton 
or Liverpool some 6,500 miles from Buenos Ayres, and 
then cross the North Atlantic 3,000 miles more, sailing 
some 10,000 miles north and east and then southwest, to 
make less than 6, 000 miles north, and visiting the eastern 
hemisphere in order to get from one point to another in 
the western hemisphere. 

If any argument can speak more loudly for any reason- 
able means of bringing the two halves of America closer 
together, the writer confesses that he does not know what 
it can be. 



THE PROGRESS OF EDUCATION 

South America Not a Unit— The Percentage of Illiteracy— Public 
Schools in Argentina— Skilled Head-masters Needed— Normal Schools 
of Brazil — The Kindergarten Department— Self-possessed Infants — 
The Influence of the United States— Woman's Former Position- 
South American Universities — Public Libraries — Mission Schools — 
McKenzie College — Education Preceding Protestant Effort. 

IN one brief chapter on so large a subject as education 
in Soutb America, one cannot go into particulars 
and quote statistics concerning the comparative lit- 
eracy of the many different republics, but merely try to 
give the general situation as a traveller learns it from 
governmental reports, conversations with educators, and 
visits to some important schools. 

It must always be borne in mind that South America 
is by no means a unit in education, politics or general ad- 
vancement. Massachusetts differs radically from Ar- 
kansas in these matters, but not nearly so much as Ven- 
ezuela differs from Argentina. In fact, Hayti and Con- 
necticut are scarcely farther apart in matters of education 
than some of the northern states of South America are 
from their southern neighbours. 

Speaking in a general way, the percentage of illiteracy 
is very high throughout South America, but the hopeful 
feature is that it is constantly growing smaller. In Bra- 
zil, for instance, a score of years ago more than eighty per 
cent, of the people could neither read nor write, now the 
percentage is reduced to less than seventy, and constant 
improvement is recorded. 

295 



296 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

While in Colombia and Venezuela very little is done 
for education except by the Catholic priests and Protestant 
missionaries, in Argentina and Chile good government 
free schools are provided in most places, and the people 
of all classes are almost as keen for an education as in 
New York or Illinois. In Buenos Ayres, in Santiago, in 
Sao Paulo, you will find some of the finest school build- 
ings in the world, while many of the back districts are as 
innocent of schoolhouses as the desert of Sahara. 

On the whole, Argentina seems to have the best system 
of public schools, and one that is becoming the model of 
the other more progressive republics. Argentina in turn 
imported her school system from the United States, and 
in its earlier days brought many teachers from the States 
to introduce it. When her own teachers were educated 
and her normal schools were established, the American 
teachers were sent home, but not before they had set their 
seal indelibly upon the schools of the second greatest re- 
public of South America, and had influenced to a consid- 
erable degree the educational system of the whole con- 
tinent. 

In Brazil something of the same kind has been at- 
tempted, but not on so large a scale, and in Eio de 
Janeiro, though fine large public school buildings have 
been erected, it has been found difficult to obtain masters 
who could manage them, and many of the schools are still 
continued in small private homes where a few children 
gather under a single teacher, while the great schoolhouse 
has sometimes been devoted to other government uses. 

Skilled head-masters will doubtless be trained in good 
time, for in Sao Paulo the progressive capital of the most 
progressive state in Brazil, I found one of the finest nor- 
mal schools I have ever visited, and there are others of 
equally high grade in other cities. The building in which 
the Sao Paulo school is housed is truly palatial, without 



THE PROGEESS OF EDUCATION 297 

aud within. It is very large, built around a beautiful 
court adorned with flowers, aud contains not only many 
rooms for the training of teachers, but kindergarten rooms, 
and model primary schools where the normal pupils may 
get practice as well as instruction. 

There are far more women than men in training for the 
future teachers of Brazil, as is apt to be the case in our 
own normal schools, and the girls are bright, attractive, 
and apparently very much in earnest in their classes. 

I was particularly interested in the kindergarten rooms 
of the normal school, in noticing the difference between 
young Latin America, and young Anglo-Saxon America. 
The Brazilian infants were as self-possessed as the Sefiors 
and Senoritas themselves. They not only went through 
their games and their calisthenics without any show of 
embarrassment at the strangers who were looking on, but 
gave their recitations and acted their little plays with all 
the assurance and sangfroid of experienced orators and 
actors. No sheepish looks, no fingers stuck in little 
mouths, no stage fright or embarrassed forgetfulness, but 
each one not only "remembered her manners,'' but mod- 
ulated her voice, smiled or frowned, and gesticulated in 
the appropriate places, as though she had been all her 
life before the footlights. 

It is a racial characteristic, — this self-possession and 
lack of embarrassment. Indeed, among children as well 
as grown people, the Anglo-Saxon is the most bashful and 
self-conscious to be found in any part of the world. 

In his religion, too, the Anglo-Saxon assumes indiffer- 
ence and refuses to pray or read his Bible when any one 
is looking, while the Turk five times a day prostrates 
himself with his face towards Mecca, the Eussian soldier 
prays before the whole regiment, and the Eoman priest 
thumbs his prayer book in every railway train. 

The same self-possession and disregard of spectators is 



298 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITT 

seen in all lines of public effort, and is nowhere more no- 
ticeable than in the little men and women of the public 
schools that one sees in Latin America. 

The founder of the great SSo Paulo Normal school, Miss 
Brown, was an American, and her name is still held in 
fragrant remembrance in the State and in educational 
circles throughout Brazil. 

Other normal schools are being multiplied in different 
centres of Brazil, and will doubtless have a great effect in 
promoting the efficiency of the public schools of this great 
republic. 

When crossing Lake Titicaca one dark and stormy 
night, bound from Peru to Bolivia, I was interested to 
see among my fellow passengers half a dozen Chileno 
girls who were going to Bolivia to teach in the public 
schools. At their head was an intelligent German lady 
who told me that her charges though not ideal teachers, 
were the best she could get, and far better than any who 
had yet been educated in Bolivia. She said they were 
particularly lacking in physical stamina, took little ex- 
ercise, and were too much afraid of fresh air. This seems 
to be a characteristic of South American women gener- 
ally. They have not yet escaped the thraldom of indoor 
life which was their heritage from the old Spanish regime. 

In fact, in the older days, women were little more than 
prisoners in the home, and the careful father and husband 
when he went to business would turn the key on them we 
are told, that they might come to no harm and enter into 
no entangling alliances during his absence. Though 
women have now a large amount of freedom, the old ideas 
that prevailed in North America half a century ago are 
rife in some quarters, that it is more ladylike to have a sal- 
low complexion, flaccid muscles and general languor, than 
to run and row and play basket-ball and tennis. But doubt- 
less with larger social freedom and a more liberal educa- 



THE PEOGEESS OF EDUCATION 299 

tion will come more wholesome views of physical exercise 
and development. 

Every South American country that I have visited has 
its university under the patronage of the state, but it 
does not often seem to play a large part in the life of the 
country, or to give its students a very profound educa- 
tion. The strong points of the university are the classics 
and literature, their weak points science and engineering 
and allied practical subjects. As a matter of fact, the 
thoroughly educated men in all branches of professional 
life expect to finish their education in Europe or the 
United States. This is a good thing in its way, as it 
induces travel, and brings far more educated South 
Americans in touch with foreign ideas than would other- 
wise imbibe them. I was not surprised that these uni- 
versities were not more important factors in the national 
life, but rather that they existed at all in some countries, 
like Uruguay for instance, where revolution has suc- 
ceeded revolution in such quick succession that one 
would suppose the people would have no time left from 
their strenuous politics to devote to science or belle 
lettres. Yet the most conspicuous building one sees 
on landing at Montevideo is the university near the 
shore. 

Every large city, too, has its library, usually not very 
extensive as compared with the great modern libraries of 
North America, and Europe, but containing very credit- 
able collections of Spanish and foreign authors. 

The National Peruvian library contains fifty thousand 
volumes, and is rich in the records of early Spanish 
times.v It suffered greatly, in the late Peruvian-Chilean 
war, when it was sacked by the Chileans, and many of 
the most precious volumes were stolen, while others were 
torn up or thrown out of the windows by the vandals. 
This piece of wanton pillage and destruction still rankles 



300 THE CONTINENT OP OPPOKTUNITY 

most hotly in tlie veins of the patriotic Peruvians, who 
are awaiting their chance for a bloody reprisal. 

In Eio de Janeiro is a famous Portuguese library, one 
of the best in the world, beautiful in its exterior, over 
which carved statues of the greatest Portuguese stand 
guard, while within the works of all the important Portu- 
guese authors fill the shelves. Brazil is indeed the home 
of the best Portuguese literature of the day, and the 
greatest poets who have written in that mellifluous lan- 
guage for a hundred years have been and are Brazilian 
citizens. 

No account of the educated or educational life of Brazil, 
however brief, is complete without some notice of the 
distinctively American schools founded by American 
missionaries of the Presbyterian and Methodist boards. 
Their educational work has been as great as their evan- 
gelistic, and it has been pursued diligently from the 
beginning of the missions more than forty years ago. 

Some of the schools, like the Methodist college of Lima, 
the Instituto Ingles in Santiago, and the American col- 
lege for girls in the same city, the Methodist schools in 
Concepcion, Chile, and in Buenos Ayres, and McKenzie 
College in Sao Paulo, have achieved more than a national 
reputation. They are patronized by students from the 
best families. Presidents, governors, senators, and men 
of large means, send their children to them, for they are 
recognized in many cities as giving the best education 
that can be obtained. 

The Instituto Ingles in Santiago under the able direc- 
tion of Dr. Browning of the Presbyterian Board of mis- 
sions, may be taken as a representative of one of these 
schools of higher grade. It takes boys practically through 
the sophomore year of our average North American col- 
lege, and is always crowded with students, with a long 
waiting list that cannot be accommodated. I have never 



THE PEOGEESS OF EDUCATION 301 

addressed a brighter or more attractive company of boys 
than I met at more than one chapel exercise in the Insti- 
tuto Ingles of Santiago. Here were not only young 
Chileans, but many Bolivians and some from Peru and 
Argentina, so that the school has an opportunity of doing 
an international work for South America scarcely less 
important than Eobert College on the Bosphorus is doing 
for the Balkan states, or the Syrian College of Constanti- 
nople for the Levant. 

When I went into the playground I found that the 
boys could play even harder than they could study, an 
excellent sign, I believe, of virility and national vigour. 
In fact, I have never seen such untiring and enthusiastic 
devotion to football as I witnessed at Santiago. 

The Institute publishes an excellent school magazine, 
the Southern Gross, which in its make-up and literary 
excellence would do credit to any North American school 
of like grade. 

It is distinctly understood by all patrons and parents 
that the school is a Protestant school, that the Bible is 
to be read and studied, and that attendance at morning 
prayers is compulsory, though students can attend the 
church of their parents' preference. Yet, though of 
course the great majority of the students are from Eoman 
Catholic families, these requirements do not seem to 
diminish the popularity of the school. 

McKenzie College of Sao Paulo, Brazil, was also founded 
by the Presbyterian Board of missions, and is undoubt- 
edly the school of the highest grade of its kind in South 
America. It has long been famous throughout Brazil. 
It is how under a separate board of trustees and no 
longer directly accountable to the Presbyterian Board, 
and, in the opinion of most, has largely lost its evangelical 
character. It is, however, an intellectual centre of much 
power for all Brazil, occupies large and handsome build- 



302 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

iDgs in a commanding situation near the heart of ^U) 
Paulo, and has educated some of the most influential 
professional and business men in Brazil. 

There are also a multitude of mission schools of 
primary or grammar grade in South America, which are 
doing a quiet but vastly important work, for many of 
them are found in communities where were it not for 
them, children would receive na education at all. Often 
the missionary finds that the only practical way of obtain- 
ing entrance to the Hbmes and hearts of the people is to 
establish a school. 

In La Paz, for instance, the capital of Bolivia, the first 
thing done by the Methodist missionaries, Dr. and Mrs. 
Harrington, was to open a boarding school for boys, 
which was so immediately successful that the very first 
year boys had to be turned away for lack of room. Very 
soon the Bolivian government invited Dr. Harrington to 
take charge of public instruction in the Oruro district, 
one of the most important sections of Bolivia, and voted 
him a subvention of $36,000 for his work. No stronger 
proof could be given of the estimate placed by a progress- 
ive South American republic on the educational value 
and capability of an American missionary. 

Of course the Protestant religion cannot be taught in 
these public schools, and it seems to involve in a measure 
an unfortunate union of church and state, but it gives the 
missionary an admirable opportunity to teach ethics, and 
to mold the morals of the rising generation of Oruro, an 
opportunity which he will be sure to improve. 

This brief outlook over the educational situation of 
South America is certainly a hopeful one. It shows the 
continent to be in this respect, as in so many others, the 
land of opportunity and progress. The schoolmaster is 
coming to his own in South America, as in the rest of the 
world. The people are eager for education and are will- 



THE PEOGEESS OF EDUCATION 303 

ing to pay for it, and though these southern republics 
have hitherto lagged far behind their great sister of North 
America, most of them are now doing their best to make 
the gap ever narrower and narrower. 



XXXVII 

THE INSCRUTABLE POLITICS OF SOUTH AMERICA 

The Periodical Upheavals — Why Foreigners do not Get Naturalized — The 
Office-Seeking Class — Loose Allegiance to Central Government — 
The Inheritance From Spain— The Influence of Religion — The New 
England Town Meeting— Monarchy Impossible — The Presidents of 
the Republics — Facing in the Right Direction. 

POLITICS in South America is a difficult and 
perilous subject for a foreigner to discuss. It is 
hard for him to understand, and there are many- 
pitfalls for his unwary pen. I will, however, venture some 
observations of these matters as they appear to a traveller 
from North America. 

The North American is accustomed to think of at least 
two well defined political parties, of regular elections in 
which people take an immense interest, and which arouse 
unlimited excitement. In most of the South American 
republics he finds nothing of the kind. The dominant 
party, controlling the machinery of government, is almost 
sure to win, and the opposition usually take it for granted 
that it will win. In fact, it is often considered indeli- 
cate, apparently, for the opposition to take any interest 
in the election, and they often refrain from voting alto- 
gether. 

How then do they ever get into power ? Usually by a 
revolution, bloody or bloodless as the case may be, and 
this accounts for the periodical upheavals that take place 
at frequent intervals in many of the republics. "When 
the party in power becomes too ambitious or corrupt, or 
offends public sentiment too seriously on any great ques- 

304 



POLITICS OF SOUTH AMEEICA 305 

tion, then the opposition party finds its opportunity, and 
under some vigorous leader rises against its opponents, 
turns the Ins out, and installs the Outs in place of 
the Ins. 

In North America the foreigner is likely to become 
a naturalized citizen, as soon as he can legally do so 
and sometimes before, and he takes as warm an inter- 
est in politics as the descendant of the Puritan or the 
Cavalier. Indeed his interest is often more ardent, and 
he votes earlier and oftener on election day than the blue- 
blooded native. 

In South America the foreigner very rarely becomes 
naturalized, or takes any interest in national politics. 
When I asked my English, Scotch or North American 
friends who had lived practically all their lives in South 
America, why they did not cast in their lot with the 
country of their adoption, and become her naturalized 
citizens, they would shrug their shoulders and say that it 
would be of little use to vote so far as influencing the 
election was concerned, for their votes would not be 
counted unless it pleased the authorities in power to do 
so, and besides in case of trouble they preferred the pro- 
tection of their home governments. 

In North America the office-seeking class, though 
sufficiently large and clamorous, is not overwhelming in 
proportion to the people who for the most part prefer 
business, agriculture or professional life. 

In South America the proportion of office-seekers and 
the places for office-seekers seem altogether out of pro- 
portion to the people who care to do anything else, and 
most officials are said to feather their nests most success- 
fully during even a short term in office. I am speaking 
in a general way of South America, and not of all the 
republics or of all office holders as corrupt. There are 
honest and patriotic men in public office, especially in 



306 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

the higher posts, but South Americans themselves will 
be the first to assert that many most of their officials, 
are venal and have their hands conveniently behind their 
backs at all times for a bribe. 

There is no doubt a great difference between Colombia 
and Argentina, between Venezuela and Brazil, in the 
purity and efficiency of their governments, and all South 
America cannot be included under the same condemna- 
tion, any more than all the United States can be held re- 
sponsible for the unspeakable rascalities of Tammany 
Hall or the Philadelphia Eing. 

Another characteristic of South American republics, 
speaking in a general way, is the loose idea of allegiance 
to the central government and the frequent conflicts be- 
tween certain states or cities and the central authority, 
resulting in occasional, in some states almost innumerable 
revolutions. In Argentina, for instance, the so-called 
" Unitarians," and the Federalists were almost constantly 
at war for more than half a century, and in other repub- 
lics the same fight has been waged under various names. 
This conflict is not merely a struggle of the Outs and Ins 
for the spoils of office, as the superficial observer might 
suppose, though doubtless much of this spirit enters in, 
but is really a difference of political principles in regard 
to states' right, of the same sort that divided the north 
from the south, and still, to a degree, enters into the dif- 
ferences of the democratic and republican parties. 

In his illuminating book on the South American Ee- 
publics, Mr. Thomas C. Dawson traces these fundamental 
differences and consequent revolutions far back to the 
qualities of the Spanish and Portuguese mind molded in 
the earliest days of those monarchies. ''Town or com- 
munal government has been characteristic of Spain," he 
says, ''since before the Eoman conquest. . . . In the 
midst of the currents of war and victory setting to and 



POLITICS OF SOUTH AMEEICA 307 

fro, the old municipalities survived unchangeable, and 
always supplying local self-government. A tendency to- 
wards decentralization was ingrained in the Spanish 
people from the earliest times. . . . The death of a 
king or the marriage of his daughter was often the signal 
for war, and a readjustment of boundaries, but these 
overturniugs did not much affect the component and 
really vital political units. . . . Colonies founded by 
a monarchy so organized could never be firmly knit to 
each other nor to the mother country. The only bond of 
union would be personal allegiance to the monarch." 

A remembrance of these facts accounts for much that 
seems unstable, erratic and even unaccountable in these 
South American republics to the Anglo-Saxon mind, and 
we see that all these revolutions and counter revolutions 
which for a century have been seething in the southern 
half of America, making the countries seem oftentimes 
like opera-bouffe republics, is really the irrepressible con- 
flict between local rights and centralized national power, 
and is the necessary prelude to national consciousness and 
stability. 

It must also be borne in mind in considering the politics 
of South America, as compared with North America, 
that religion has been a deciding factor, — the religion of 
the mother lands. As the Brazilian Journal well puts it : 
''Great Britain bequeathed to her li^orth American 
colonies liberty of conscience and action ; education of the 
people, pure Christian family life, morality, woman ele- 
vated and respected ; a deep rooted religious sense and a 
strong conviction of individual responsibility ; happiness 
and prosperity. 

''The heritage which Spain and Portugal left their 
South American colonies under papal rule, was priestly 
tyranny and corruption, ignorance of the masses and il- 
legitimacy ; defective morality, superstition, bigotry or 



308 THE COi^TINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

open unbelief ; external forms of religion degenerated into 
downright idolatry ; chronic revolutions and bank- 
ruptcy." 

Many intelligent South Americans in all the countries 
whom I have met would endorse these strong words, and 
say that the religion of the respective halves of America 
has had not a little to do with the development of her 
politics. 

Another blessing which North America often fails to 
appreciate, but which South America never knew, was 
the New England town meeting. Though the Spanish 
communities had a town or communal government, the 
common people had little to do with it, and left it to the 
junta, often self-elected to run. They knew nothing of 
free discussion, unlimited expression of opinion, and fear- 
less settlement of all questions at the polls by a majority 
vote. 

This institution, which more than any other one estab- 
lished republicanism throughout the United States, and 
which, journeying west with the movement of population, 
made democratic principles sure and educated the people 
in their use, was not indigenous to South American soil, 
and there has been no educative influence like it to 
prepare the way for republicanism south of the 
Isthmus. 

But the hopeful and cheering thing to remember is that 
all these republics with two or three exceptions are front- 
ing in the right direction. Their faces are towards the 
sunrise and not the sunset. They are leaving anarchy, 
petty squabbling and misrule behind, and are advancing 
towards a stable, responsible government based more and 
more upon the will of the people. 

True republicanism is growing stronger with every 
decade except in the northern countries of Venezuela and 
Colombia, and possibly Ecuador. Monarchy has abso- 



POLITICS OF SOUTH AMEEICA 309 

lately no chance of imposing its chains on South America 
again. 

While I was in Brazil, a grandson of the last Emperor, 
Pedro II, came to Eio de Janeiro, the capital of his grand- 
father' s old domain, but he was not allowed to land. Yet 
the refusal created no excitement, and aroused no mon- 
archical reaction, but was regarded by all as a sensible 
and prudent action on the part of the government and 
largely in the interests of the young prince himself, who 
might have fared hardly at the hands of fanatical repub- 
licans. 

There has been no important revolution in any influen- 
tial republic for several years, and Brazil and Argentina, 
Chile and Peru and Bolivia seem to have a government 
almost as stable as France or the TJnited States. If a 
revolution should occur in any of these countries, it would 
probably be largely a bloodless one, and would mean the 
accession to power of some rival faction of the govern- 
ment by irregular means. 

The hopeful thing to note about South American poli- 
tics, as I have said, is that they are on the up grade in 
most of the states. They are still venal and shamelessly 
corrupt in many departments of many states, if all re- 
ports are to be believed, and most unstable and rickety 
in others, but, compared with the state of things half a 
century or even a quarter of a century ago, there has been 
a vast improvement. 

Anarchy is giving way to order, bloody revolutions are 
replaced by peaceful revolutions, even where free and fair 
elections are not held, and honesty is coming to be con- 
sidered a prerequisite for the highest offices in aU the en- 
lightened states. 

As a famous old professor of theology used to say to 
his students : ''It makes a vast difference which way a 
man is facing. Two men may be upon the same spot on 



310 THE CONTIKENT OF OPPOETUKITY 

the hill, one facing up the hill, and the other down, but 
the man going up has a much better chance of reaching 
the top than the one going down," 

The South American republics for the most part are 
facing up the hill, so difficult to climb, of an honest gov- 
ernment of the people, for the people and by the people. 
May they all succeed in reaching the top. 



xxxvin 

SOUTH AMERICA AS A MISSION FIELD 

A Legitimate Mission Field— Catholicism in North and South America— 
The Brave Jesuits— The Corrupt Priesthood of To-day— Caring for 
Foundlings— " A Letter of Jesus Christ"— St, Peter's Toe— Men in 
Protestant Churches — Catholic Missionaries in Protestant Lands— 
The Eeproof of the Bishop of Cochabamba— The Hopeful Side— The 
United States a South American Power. 

SOME people are found who deny that South 
America is a legitimate mission field for Protes- 
tant effort. They say that the country is already 
practically evangelized. That the first Spanish discover- 
ers brought the Christian religion with them, that it has 
spread throughout the continent, and that Protestant 
Boards of missions should turn their attention to other 
quarters of the globe. There is even an English Protes- 
tant church in South America which has been unwilling 
that its building should be used for any native Protes- 
tant gathering, or for any missionary purpose, lest it 
should offend the susceptibilities of the Catholics, and 
possibly lead to a loss of their trade on the part of the 
Protestant merchants. 

I scarcely think that this last is an uncharitable sug- 
gestion, from what I know of this church. A few facts 
will however show that South America is one of the 
most legitimate fields for Protestant missionary effort in 
the world. 

In the first place, the condition of the Catholic church 
of South America shows the need of some vivifying re- 
ligious influence. The Eoman Catholic church of South 

311 



312 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

America is as different from the same church in North 
America as Spain is different from New England. In 
South America it is still in the darkness and corruption 
of the middle ages. In North America it has been 
leavened by hundreds of years of contact with an enlight- 
ened progressive Protestantism. 

I am not one of those who would berate and deride 
Roman Catholicism. I regret sincerely the tendency of 
some of my brethren to magnify all the defects and short- 
comings of the Catholic church and to harp upon her 
present evils and her early history of persecution. I 
recognize the true Christianity and spotless character of 
many in the church of Rome, and the heroism of her 
pioneers, especially the early Jesuits, whose self-sacrific- 
ing piety has never been surpassed in the annals of 
Protestantism. 

In fact, the story of Jesuit occupation of South America 
as well as North America, abounds in heroic incidents. 
There is scarcely a nobler figure in history than that of 
Padre Jose de Anchieta, a follower of Francis Xavier, 
and a man of like spirit, who established himself in Sao 
Paulo and as one of its founders doubtless did much to 
make that the most progressive state in Brazil. A frag- 
ment from his own story best tells his character. 
''Here we are," he says, " sometimes more than twenty 
of us together in a little hut of mud and wicker, roofed 
with straw, fourteen paces long and ten wide. This is at 
once the school, the infirrnary, dormitory, refectory, 
kitchen and storeroom. Yet we covet not the more 
spacious dwellings which our brethren have in other 
parts. Our Lord Jesus Christ was in a far straiter place 
when it was His pleasure to be born among beasts in a 
manger, and in a still straiter when He deigned to die 
upon the cross." 

Yet when it is admitted that there were such heroes 



SOUTH AMEETCA AS A MISSION FIELD 313 

in the early days of the Catholic church of South America, 
and that there are still pure and earnest souls, both 
among the laity and the priesthood, it is also admitted 
by all, even by intelligent Catholics, themselves, that in 
South America the church is decadent and corrupt. The 
immorality of the priests is taken for granted. Priests' 
sons and daughters, of course born not in wedlock, 
abound everywhere, and no stigma attaches to them or 
to their fathers and mothers. In fact it is scarcely con- 
sidered immorality, for as the priests are forbidden to 
marry, it is expected that they will have illegitimate re- 
lations with one or more women. 

A number of South American prelates petitioned Pope 
Leo XIII a few years ago, on account of frequent 
scandals, to allow South American priests to marry, but 
the Pope would not hear to it, and the old scandals 
(scandals chiefly in the eyes of the Protestant communi- 
ties) go on and increase. 

Like priest like people. The immorality of the priests 
is doubtless one reason for the looseness of the family tie 
in all parts of South America. While divorces are not 
allowed for any cause, separations and illegal alliances 
are very easy and very common. Every large city has 
public orphan asylums where babies are thrust in and no 
questions asked. In fact, every convenience is arranged 
to prevent the recognition of the parents. A kind of 
three quarter barrel is fixed in the door with the side to- 
wards the street cut half way down. In this the found- 
ling is placed, a bell is rung, and the attendant of the 
foundling house comes, turns the barrel around, and 
takes out the baby, while it is purposely made impossible 
for him or any one else to see who left the child for the 
state to provide for. In the small city of Arequipa forty 
children every month are thus left at the public foundling 
houses. Some such arrangement, varying only in detail, 



314 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

is provided in every large city of South America, and 
cannot but promote immorality and illegitimacy. A 
considerable percentage of these foundlings are said to be 
children of the priests. Surely to introduce a purer code 
of morality and a higher standard of living, Protestant- 
ism is necessary in South America. 

Gross superstition is still cultivated assiduously by the 
Catholic church in many parts of South America, and it 
is unrebuked tacitly or openly by any large reform ele- 
ment. 

Mr. Lewis T. A. Peters, a Protestant printer of Buenos 
Ayres, has given me a translation of a Eoman Catholic 
tract which was recently handed him on the street of the 
capital of Argentina near one of the leading churches. I 
have room for but a small portion of the translation 
which I am assured has been carefully and accurately 
made. It is entitled, '' Letter of Jesus Christ about the 
Drops of Blood which He shed whilst He went to Cal- 
vary." The letter, says the tract, was found in the Holy 
Sepulchre, and is preserved in a silver casket by His 
Holiness. The letter says : ''You know that the armed 
soldiers numbered 150, twenty-five of whom conducted 
me bound ; the administrators of justice numbered thirty- 
three. I received fifty blows with the fist on the head, 
and 108 on the breast. I was pulled by the hair twenty- 
three times, and thirty persons spat on my face. Those 
who struck me on the upper part of the body were 6,666 
and 100 Jews struck me on the head. I was put upon 
the cross at the eighteenth hour, and at the same time I 
sighed 125 times. The wounds on the head numbered 
twenty ; from the crown of thorns seventy -two ; points of 
thorns on the forehead, 100. After flogging they dressed 
me as a fool in a white garment, the wounds on the body 
were 100. . . . There came out of my body 28,430 
drops of blood. 



SOUTH AMEEICA AS A MISSION FIELD 315 

" The person who says seven Fadre Nuestros, seven Ave 
Marias and nine Gloria Fatras, for the space of fifteen years, 
to pay for the number of drops of blood I have shed, I will 
aportion five Graeias. The first, plenary indulgence from 
all sins ; the second he will be liberated from all the pains 
of purgatory ; third, if he should die before finishing the 
fifteen years he wiU be pardoned ; fourth, he shall be re- 
garded as though he had been killed and had shed all his 
blood for the holy faith ; I will come down from heaven 
to look for his soul and those of his relations to the fourth 
grade." 

That such sacrilegious foolishness is circulated in the 
chief city of South America, and believed by the masses, 
however deluded, seems incredible, were it not of a piece 
with much that one sees in the churches and other sacred 
places of South America. I have myself seen indulgence 
for sin and a promise of heaven offered to those who will 
kiss the toe of a bronze statue of St. Peter in a South 
American church, a small reduplication, of the great 
statue in St. Peter's at Eome, and am assured that similar 
notices are very common. 

Need anything else be quoted to show the superstition 
that is encouraged in South America to-day, or the need 
of the enlightening influences of a purer faith ? If Prot- 
estantism never made one convert from Catholicism, it is 
needed in South America to show what pure, unadulter- 
ated religion really is. 

Indeed, its chief work is not to proselytize from the 
Eoman Catholic church, but to afford a rational faith for 
those who have left the Eoman church and are drifting 
or have drifted into the worst of all spiritual deserts, the 
cold and barren regions of absolute unbelief. It cannot 
be said that the overwhelming majority of the people of 
South America are Eoman Catholics. Most of the peo- 
ple, to be sure, are baptized, and buried, by a priest, but 



316 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

those are the only occasions when many have any use for 
him. The churches are full of women and empty of men. 
I have been in churches where I have seen hundreds of 
women worshippers, and when I, a heretic, in their esti- 
mation, was the only man within its walls. 

The unbelief of the men or their utter indifference to 
spiritual things, is the greatest peril of South America, 
and if Protestantism can do anything to avert this peril 
and stem this tide of indifferentism, it is in duty bound to 
do it. That the Protestant churches do reach the men is 
evident to the most casual observer. Their predominance 
is as striking in the meetings of the Protestants as the 
preponderance of the women in the Catholic churches. I 
have counted more than fifty men and only two or three 
women in little Protestant chapels of Peru and Bolivia, 
and even in Argentina and Brazil where Protestantism 
has been longer established, and is better known, and 
consequently where the women dare to attend the services, 
the majority of the congregation are men. At scores of 
Christian Endeavour meetings in half a dozen republics, 
I have noticed this disparity of women so unusual at 
home. 

Once more, if any further reasons are demanded for the 
peaceful invasion of South America by Protestantism, 
it is found in the fact that Catholics do not hesitate to 
send their missionaries to every Protestant country. 
America, England, Holland, even Norway and Sweden, 
so overwhelmingly Protestant, are full of them, and it is 
only right that on a fair field and without favour from 
governmental authorities, both religions should have a 
chance to prove which is better fitted to the needs of the 
twentieth century. 

One would think that the Eoman Catholics themselves 
would welcome the coming of a strong and virile faith 
which has done so much to purify and ennoble their own 



SOUTH AMEEICA AS A MISSION FIELD 317 

churcli in all countries where Protestantism is strong, for 
they themselves being the witnesses, there is need enough 
of such purification. 

Some years ago the Bishop of Cochabamba, Bolivia, was 
asked by a distinguished man to retain in his office a priest 
who had been unfrocked for a very serious misdemean- 
our. The Bishop while acceding to the request, vented 
his real opinion of the priests of his district in the follow- 
ing letter : " I have done all in my power to pull them 
out of the cesspool of ignorance and vice. . . . They 
are always the same — brutal, drunken, seducers of inno- 
cence, without religion and without conscience. Better 
would be the people without them. . . . The priests 
of these villages have no idea of God, nor of the religion 
of which they are the professed ministers. They never 
study. Their daily round of life is first to fill their stom- 
achs, then the disorders of the bed, from these to the tem- 
ple looking for more prey for their horrible sacrilege, then 
back to laziness, drunkenness and the awful disorders of 
the bed again. You cannot imagine the pain these things 
give me. I am sick and tired of it all. There are excep- 
tions, but so very few that they are not enough to miti- 
gate the pain. (Signed) Alfonso, Bishop." 

Things have doubtless improved somewhat in Bolivia 
since this letter was written, but it still describes the con- 
dition in many parishes in the remoter regions of South 
America, and many like testimonies could be adduced. 

An eminent Protestant theologian of England likes to 
tell his students the remark of a Catholic Bishop, a friend 
of his, who declared before the Ecumenical Council that 
pronounced the dogma of the infallibility of the Pope, 
that the Spirit of God would never allow the Council to 
promulgate such a doctrine. When the Council was over, 
and the dogma proclaimed, the Protestant theologian re- 
minded his Catholic friend of this former statement, and 



318 THE CON^TINENT OF OPPOETUKITY 

asked how it happened, since the Holy Spirit guided the 
Council's actions. "What can you expect the Holy 
Spirit to do with a lot of South American bishops!" was 
the quick reply. 

Enlightened Catholics in other parts of the world rec- 
ognize the degeneracy of the Eomish church in South 
America, and doubtless deplore it profoundly. One 
would think they would welcome the purifying example 
and emulation in righteousness which the growth of Prot- 
estantism would bring. 

As in other aspects of affairs South American, there is 
a hopeful side, so it is in matters religious and ecclesias- 
tical. There are already signs in some places that the 
great historic church of South America is feeling the 
vivifying influences of freer thought, and the larger out- 
look of the twentieth century. The Bible has been widely 
circulated in all the languages of South America, and is 
constantly winning its way to the hearts of the people. 

All the republics except Peru have decreed full religious 
liberty, and the President of the Peruvian republic him- 
self told me that while the constitution of Peru was illib- 
eral, the temper of the people was very liberal to Prot- 
estantism. And this I found to be true except in such 
bigoted, priest-ridden cities as Arequipa. 

Surely the United States has some responsibility in 
sending a purer gospel to her sister republics of the 
southern hemisphere. We are already a South American 
power as Bishop Neely in his admirable little book re- 
minds us. Since we control the Panama Canal and the 
Canal zone, five miles wide, in the Eepublic of Panama, 
which is a South American power, we can no longer hold 
ourselves aloof from South American affairs, or refuse 
our share of responsibility for her welfare. 

In most of the South American countries the United 
States is honoured ; in all of them she is respected, in 



SOUTH AMEEICA AS A MISSION FIELD 319 

some she is beloved as a friend, and, if necessary, as an 
ally. 

Coveting no foot of South American territory, but de- 
siring the best good of both Americas, one duty of North 
America is to send to the South land the best education, 
the best morality, the best religion which she herself 
possesses, for, by thus giving freely, she herself will be 
enriched, and the ideals of both halves of the great 
American continent will be ennobled. 



xxxr^ 

A BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF PROTESTANT MISSIONS 

No Longer the Neglected Continent — The Presbyterians and Methodists— 
The Work of the Southern Baptists— The South American Missionary 
Society — The Moravians in the North — An Independent Congrega- 
tional Church — The Gospel Mission of Kansas — The Great Work of 
the Bible Societies — The Bible in Brazil — Foreign Churches — Work 
for the Sailors — The Y. M. C. A. — Christian Endeavour Societies, 

THE scope and design of this volume do not ad- 
mit of any detailed account of missionary oper- 
ations in South America. For such accounts I 
must refer my readers to Dr. Brown's " Latin America," 
the little volume published by the Student Volunteer Move- 
ment, entitled, "Protestant Missions in South America," 
Miss Guinness' "The Neglected Continent," to Eev. H. C. 
Tucker's "Bible in Brazil," and to numberless mission- 
ary reports and minutes. 

I can only hope to prove, as I enumerate the forces at 
work for evangelical Christianity, that South America is 
no longer preeminently "the Neglected Continent," but 
the Continent of Opportunity for Protestant missions, as 
well as for all material advancement. 

The American Presbyterians and the American Method- 
ists (both North and South) have thus far been the 
largest factors in the evangelization of South America, 
and the missions of one or the other of these denomina- 
tions are found in every republic of the continent. 

The Presbyterians have done and are doing splendid 
work in the northern republics of Colombia and Vene- 
zuela, in Chile and especially in Brazil, where they have 

320 



PEOTESTANT MISSIONS 321 

long been established, and bave raised up an efficient and 
eloquent native ministry. 

The Methodists have done much of the pioneer educa- 
tional work in Peru, have recently established themselves 
in Bolivia, are strong in Chile, and especially so in 
Argentina and Uruguay, in which latter republic their 
missions are the only ones of importance. 

My regret that I cannot give more space to the work of 
these greatest of factors in the evangelization of South 
America, and to other denominational missions, a work to 
which it would take volumes to do justice, is tempered 
by the fact that full reports of these missions can be ob- 
tained at their respective denominational headquarters. 
Other agencies not so well known, must be accorded a 
place in any account, however brief, of missionary enter- 
prise in South America. 

In Brazil the Southern Methodist Church has taken 
over the work begun by the liJ^orthern Methodists, and 
their schools and churches are powerful factors in the 
making of a new Brazil. 

The Southern Baptists of the United States also have a 
strong and fruitful work in Brazil, and are beginning in 
Argentina with large hopes of success. In this republic, 
too, a beginning has been made by the Disciples of 
Christ, while the Canadian Baptists have a mission in 
needy Bolivia. For a time they were established in La 
Paz, the capital of Bolivia, but the illness or death of 
their missionaries obliged them to withdraw for a time, 
during which the Methodists occupied this field, though 
the Baptists still hold the fort at Oruro, an important city 
in Southern Bolivia. 

The work of the South American Missionary Society of 
the Church of England is an interesting and important 
one, and is the oldest continuous mission of all, except 
that of the Moravians, having celebrated its sixtieth an- 



322 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOKTUNITY 

niversary in 1904. It was baptized in suffering and 
martyrdom, for Captain Allen F. Gardiner, of the Eoyal 
Navy, one of the heroes of missionary annals of all the 
centuries, was the founder of this society. He died of 
starvation at Spaniard Harbour, Terra del Fuego, in Sep- 
tember, 1851. 

The field in the extreme south so early occupied by 
these heroic missionaries, is still manned by them, but 
the Indians in these parts are a fast disappearing race, 
killed off by the rum and licentiousness of civilization (?) 
and the society has extended its field to embrace the 
Araucanian Indians, a strong and warlike race in South- 
ern Chile, and the Indians of the Paraguayan Chaco — that 
is the western portion of the Eepublic of Paraguay, 
which is for the most part a vast plain covered with palm 
forests and sparsely peopled. 

The "Eegions Beyond Mission," established by Dr. 
Guinness of London, is another important element in the 
evangelization of South America, especially among the 
Incas of Peru, for whom the younger Dr. Guinness is 
about to make a new and special effort, purchasing a 
great hacienda or farm, ten miles in extent, where the 
Indians may live free from the cruel exactions of their 
taskmasters, who have reduced them almost to a state of 
slavery, and where they may be at the same time under 
Christian influences. 

The oldest and one of the most important missions in 
South America is that of the Moravians in British and 
Dutch Guiana. Indeed, this denominatiou, famed for its 
missionary spirit, and for seeking out the hardest fields, 
established these stations long before the reputed birth of 
modern missions in England or America, — long before 
William Carey left the shoemaker's bench for India, or 
the devoted students gathered under the haystack at 
Williamstown. In 1738 the Morayians began their mis- 



i^EOTESTANT MISSIONS 323 

sion in British Guiana, and in 1739 in Dutch Guiana, 
and in their churches they number more communicants 
to-day than any one missionary society in South America. 

An important development in the religious life of 
South America was the planting of an independent Con- 
gregational church in Eio de Janeiro by Dr. KeUey, a 
Scotchman, in 1855. This church has a vigorous and 
influential life to-day, while from it have sprung several 
other independent churches in different parts of Brazil, 
and a missionary society called ''Help for Brazil," which 
has several missionaries and occupies five or six stations. 

An interesting feature of these Congregational churches 
is that they are thoroughly Brazilian in their member- 
ship, their pastors and their support. Dr. Kelley went 
back to Scotland more than thirty years ago, leaving his 
church in the hands of a native pastor, and from that 
day no help has come from foreign sources, and no con- 
nection is maintained with churches in other lands. 

It will be seen that there is no lack of missionary 
societies at work in South America. In fact, when one 
enumerates them all, he finds that there are no less than 
thirty-seven, some of which, to be sure, are very small, 
but all of which are doing something for the evangeliza- 
tion of the Continent of Opportunity, though I regret to 
say that the object of one or two seems chiefly to capture 
the converts made by other missions. 

We must not forget the independent workers, like 
Eev. J. S. Watson of Lima, and Eev. J. L. Jarrett of 
Arequipa, who have laboured long and successfully and 
largely at their own charges, supporting themselves by 
teaching or in other ways as opportunity offered ; making 
it their first business, however, like William Carey, to 
preach the gospel, while they did these "other things 
to pay expenses." Their churches have recently joined 
" The Eegions Beyond Mission." 



324 THE CONTINENT OF^jfPORTUNITY 

The State of Kansas has the honour of having a South 
American mission of its own. "The Gospel Mission of 
Kansas," with its headquarters at Kansas City, Kansas, 
supports Rev. William Reed in Ecuador, one of the few 
workers in the forest region of Northern South America ; 
Mr. Detweiler of Quito is another independent missionary 
whose work should not be overlooked. 

Among the agencies for the spread of pure Christianity 
in South America, none has been blessed of Providence 
more than the Bible Societies, both the American and 
the British and Foreign Bible societies. For many years 
the colporteurs of these societies have gone up and down 
throughout South America, on railroad trains and coach, 
on mule back and on foot, following up the great rivers 
in dugout canoes, receiving often insults and contumely, 
and sometimes stones, cabbages or potatoes not presented, 
but thrown at their heads as a reward of their self-sacri- 
ficing work. 

I shall never forget a typical scene in Peru, new and 
strange to me, but common enough to all colporteurs, 
that I witnessed at a little railway station. My friend, 
the Bible agent, dismounted from the train, unpacked his 
bundle of Bibles and portions of the Bible, unstrapped 
his baby organ, and sitting down in the midst of the filth 
and flies, began to play some gospel tunes. Quickly the 
people gathered around him, the railroad hands, the 
fruit sellers, old hags dishevelled and half naked, and 
little children alike. He had not played one tune half 
through before he had an audience, and at the end of the 
tune the sale began. No Bibles were given away, for it 
was not necessary. The people are willing to buy, espe- 
cially the small portions, containing a single gospel, which 
could be had for the equivalent of a penny. When trade 
became slack, another tune on the baby organ would 
bring the people back and the sales would go on once 



PEOTESTANT MISSIONS 325 

more, while the colporteur all the time he sold the "Word, 
explained its value and importance to willing ears. 

Such scenes have been going on all over South America 
for many years, in the most populous cities, as well as in 
the most remote forests, and the gospel leaven which has 
thus been disseminated is beyond calculation. I rejoice 
to number among the friends whom I made on my jour- 
ney, such men as Eev. A. E. Stark of the British and 
Foreign Bible Society of Callao, Eev. Mr. Milne, the 
veteran agent of the American Bible Society of Buenos 
Ayres, recently deceased, Eev. J. H. Wenburg of La Paz, 
Eev. Mr. Pilling of Santiago, and Eev. H. 0. Tucker of 
Eio de Janeiro, in whose hospitable home I found a 
delightful temporary abode while in the capital of Brazil. 

If one desires a book beside which most novels are 
dull, which abounds in information concerning the 
country as well as in regard to the Scripture in Brazil, 
let him get "The Bible in Brazil," ^ by this same accom- 
plished agent of the American Bible Society, Eev. H. C. 
Tucker. 

There are various foreign Protestant churches in South 
America, which must also be numbered among the evan- 
gelistic agencies. In Valparaiso, Chile, the Union church 
under the lead of Eev. W. B. Inglis, is doing an admirable 
work as is also the Union church of Santiago, of which 
Dr. Lester is the much esteemed pastor. In Buenos Ayres 
are several English speaking churches, an American 
church (made up largely of English and Scotch people) 
whose pastor has long been the genial and beloved Dr. 
McLaughlin, and a Scotch church, worshipping in a 
beautiful and stately edifice, to which Eev. J. W. Flem- 
ing, B. D., has ministered with great acceptance for more 
than a quarter of a century. 

* "The Bible in Brazil," by Eev. H. C. Tucker, New York, Flem- 
ing H. Revell Company. 



326 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

Buenos Ayres, too, is the residence of Bishop Every, 
the Bishop of the Falkland Islands, whose diocese is 
perhaps the largest in the world, embracing nearly the 
whole of South America on both the East and "West 
coasts. There is a movement, however, to divide this 
unwieldy diocese, making the Andes the natural dividing 
line. 

Under Bishop Every' s jurisdiction are a number of im- 
portant churches in the large centres of population, which 
minister to the Anglicans who abound in all these cen- 
tres. The rector of one of these, the church at SSlo Paulo, 
Brazil, is Eev. H. C. Macartney, so well known for his 
writings and for his work in connection with the Keswick 
movement. 

In Eio is an English church, and a Methodist church, 
which maintains a weekly English service, and in many 
parts of Brazil where Germans abound, Lutheran churches 
have been established, to look after the flock that has 
wandered so far from the Fatherland. 

Work for the sailors has not been neglected in South 
America, and Sailors' Homes or Bethels are found in 
most of the large seaports. The Victoria Sailors' Home 
in Buenos Ayres occupies large and substantial quarters, 
and has an able superintendent in Mr. H. F. Fellows. A 
similar institution at Santos is presided over by Mr. 
Fitzgerald Holmes, and the New Central Mission in Eio, 
established by Eev. H. C. Tucker, and ministered to by 
Eev. Mr. Kennedy of the Methodist Episcopal Mission 
(South) is doing much for the sailors as well as for the 
neglected classes of this great seaport. 

The vast importance of the Protestant Christian schools 
in South America is touched upon in another chapter. 

Most of the missionary organizations make use of the 
printing press in the publication of papers and tracts in 
Spanish or Portuguese or the Indian languages, and in 



PROTESTANT MISSIO^NS 327 

furnisliing abundant literature in English for the infor- 
mation of friends at home. At least one organization, 
the Victoria Gospel Press of Buenos Ayres, is chiefly a 
printing establishment for the dissemination of the gospel 
in print in South America, and for arousing interest in 
South America in English speaking lands. 

The Salvation Army is also established in several large 
cities of the continent, and is doing its usual benevolent 
and evangelistic work. , 

There are at present but five Young Men's Christian 
Associations in South America, but where they exist, 
there are no more useful agencies in all the continent. 
They are all manned by young men from the United 
States. The Association in Buenos Ayres, under the care 
•of Mr. B. F. Shuman and his associates, is about to erect 
a fine building for which $100,000 has been raised in that 
city, and another $100,000 has been given by a friend in 
the United States. It is already a great power for good 
in the city, and will do far more with its larger equip- 
ment in the future. 

In Eio, Mr. Myron A. Clark with comparatively small 
funds at his disposal has accomplished an admirable work 
for Brazilian young men, and the evening classes, gym- 
nasium, reading room and religious meetings are all well 
attended and greatly appreciated. Mr. Clark has the 
unique distinction of being the best interpreter in Brazil 
of English into Portuguese, and I can testify to his ex- 
traordinary skill as he has stood by my side at more than 
thirty different meetings, never at loss for the right word, 
and never failing to put spirit and enthusiasm into his 
translation, — the sure test of a good interpreter. 

The Young Women's Christian Association has made 
a good beginning in Buenos Ayres under the lead of an 
admirable secretary. Miss Batty, an American young 
lady. 



328 THE CONTINENT OP OPPOETUNITY 

Last, but I hope by no means least in the evangelization 
of South America, is the work of the Christian Endeavour 
societies.- Of course the churches in South America, as 
in North America, have their organizations within them- 
selves, like the Sunday-school, Mission Circles, Ladies' 
Aid Societies, etc., but it seems fair to give a paragraph 
to the Christian Endeavour societies since they are inter- 
denominational and international in their character, and 
their unions, state and national, have a distinct life of 
their own. 

The society is represented in every country in South 
America, except where the Methodist Episcopal church, 
like Uruguay, is the only Protestant missionary force. 
In British and Dutch Guiana, in Chile and in Brazil, it 
is well represented, and in Peru, Argentina, and Colom« 
bia and Panama, a good beginning has been made. Its 
work among the Araucanian Indians has been especially 
commended. 

Counting the societies in Trinidad, which really be- 
longs to South America, there are at the present writing 
about 150 societies, and the number is constantly increas- 
ing. In Brazil is by far the largest number of societies, 
and great credit is due to Dr. Eliezer dos Sanctos Saraiva, 
who has been the secretary of the Brazilian Union from 
the beginning, for his indefatigable efforts. A South 
American Christian Endeavour Union has recently been 
formed, and the conventions, state and national, which 
I have recently attended, in Eio, Sao Paulo, Jahii, and 
other places of Brazil, show the extraordinary vigour and 
vitality of the movement. 

It is not too much to say, perhaps, that the Christian 
Endeavour Society is the one great unifying movement 
among the churches of South America, where unity is so 
much needed. There are also a number of Epworth 
Leagues connected with the Methodist Episcopal churches 



PE0TE8TANT MISSIONS 329 

doiug a good work. It would be a joy to many if they 
had a more vital connection with the only interdenomina- 
tional movement of the kind in South America. 

This chapter is already long enough, and I am aware 
that it is little more than a catalogue of Protestant re- 
ligious work in South America. But it is a catalogue of 
immense significance, for the future of the continent, and 
it is a catalogue which records names, most of which are 
personally familiar to me, and loved for their work and 
their worth's sake. It has at least the merit of giving a 
bird's-eye view, however unsatisfactory, of the chief evan- 
gelical work carried on in South America. 

I append in the supplement a tabular view of the mis- 
sionary and evangelical societies which have their fields 
in this continent. These are the latest figures I could 
obtain, but they doubtless need correction in some par- 
ticulars, corrections, I am glad to say, largely in the way 
of enlargement. 



XL 

LIGHTS AND SHADOWS ON THE MAP 

Great European Emigration — The Vast Material Resources — Free In- 
stitutions — Republicanism Intrenched — A Mediaeval Catholicism — 
Pope Leo's Encyclical — Need of a Luther — Lightning-Like Changes 
— Sr. Forgas— Illiteracy— Lives of Foreigners— The Light Winning 
Its Way. 

** "W ir THAT is the outlook for South America!" I 
%/%/ hear my readers ask. " "We do not care so 
▼ ▼ much for statistics and figures and elaborate 
details, as we do for a general view of the helps and hin- 
drances, the lights and shadows of the situation." 

He would be a rash man who, after spending only four 
months in a great continent like South America, and vis- 
iting so hastily as a traveller must in that brief time, its 
many republics, should speak with dogmatic certainty 
of the future. His cock-sure prophecies would be very 
likely to be discredited by the events. I have read too 
many such oracular statements about South America 
which have already been discredited, to desire to add to 
them. One can only speak modestly of his own impres- 
sions and describe what he has actually seen, and draw 
reasonable deductions from facts as they are. 

There are both lights and shadows on the map of South 
America. There is no doubt that the continent is devel- 
oping in material things at a tremendous rate, at least all 
the southern half of it. Emigrants are pouring in, capi- 
tal from Europe and North America seems to be supplied 
in unlimited amounts, the people in Peru, Bolivia, Ar- 
gentina and Brazil are waking up to a life of enterprise 
of which they never dreamed in the days of the Spanish 
dominion or in the early days of republican rule. 

330 



LIGHTS AND SHADOWS ON THE MAP 331 

The large European emigration grafted upon the native 
stock is producing in some of the republics practically a 
new race as in the republic of Argentina and the state of 
S§,o Paulo in Brazil, a race as distinct from any one of 
the European or Indian stocks from which it has sprung, 
as the amalgamated race of the United States is from any 
one of the mother countries. Though the people speak 
the Spanish or Portuguese languages, they are no more 
Spanish or Portuguese than the Americans are English, 
or the Boers of South Africa are Hollanders. 

This amalgamation and mixture of virile races is a 
good sign for South America, and the result will be a far 
stronger race, physically, mentally, let us hope also spir- 
itually, than though Spain or Portugal alone had fur- 
nished the only strain of European blood. 

It is difficult, too, to overestimate, as has been inti- 
mated in other chapters, the material resources of South 
America. It has double the territory of the United States 
available for emigrants and less than half the population. 
It is evident that as the United States and Canada fill up, 
and there are signs already that that day is not far dis- 
tant. South America, which now welcomes emigrants 
with open arms, will be the greatest field in the world 
for the continual inflow of the peaceful European hordes. 
Already every emigrant steamer to South America is 
crowded with Italians, Spaniards, Germans and men of 
many other nationalities, and, though the returning 
steamers also take many back to their native lands, a 
large residuum remains behind, and become the sons of 
the new soil. There is no questioning this fact, that 
South America is destined to be not only a country of 
vast resources, but of vast developed resources, and of 
enormous population, of a varied and virile European 
stock. 

Another broad patch of sunlight on the map of South 



332 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

America is its free institutions. From, the Isthmus to 
Cape Horn these free institutions are established. To be 
sure, this freedom has been abused in the past, and will 
doubtless be abused in the future. Some of the republics 
seem to be republics only in name, and Tyranny at times 
masquerades under the name of Democracy. 

But there is improvement all along the line, and real 
republicanism is making headway with every year. It 
is something to find a whole continent where free speech 
and a free press and freedom to worship God according to 
the dictates of one's conscience prevails from end to end. 
To be sure there are a few fanatical centres where free- 
dom of worship is scarcely allowed as yet, but these are 
hardly more than the exceptions that prove the conti- 
nental rule. 

A Sultan with his foot of iron on all his subject races ; 
a Czar ruling with absolute authority, and dissolving the 
people's parliament at his own caprice, is inconceivable 
in South America. In fact it would be morally and 
physically impossible for any monarchical government to 
establish itself anew on any foot of South American terri- 
tory, and the portions which still owe allegiance to Euro- 
pean powers are comparatively insignificant. 

It is a source of satisfaction to North Americans that 
in spite of the great influx of Europeans and their pre- 
dominance in business and all commercial affairs, yet the 
South American countries have so largely modelled 
themselves upon the governmental principles tested and 
tried in the United States. 

Says Dr. Thomas B. "Wood : ' ' Those ten nations (he 
wrote before Panama became a separate republic, but his 
words are now true of eleven nations) have copied our 
constitutions, our laws, our political methods ; they have 
introduced our school systems, and imported teachers 
from the United States to work them ; they have made a 



LIGHTS AND SHADOWS ON THE MAP 333 

study of our whole ' mode of existence ' as they call it, 
on purpose to seek to reproduce it among themselves. 
This is without parallel elsewhere ; and when we take 
into account the barriers of language, religion and race 
prejudice that separate them from us, their inclination to 
follow the United States — profound and all prevailing 
as it is, — stands unmatched in history." 

In a word, South America is a land of enormous re- 
sources, and is attracting a population that will develop 
them. It is a continent of liberty and large aspiration, 
whose people prize the freedom for which they have 
fought and bled so freely. It is a country where educa- 
tion, so largely neglected in the past, is making headway, 
and where superstition and bigotry are every year loosen- 
ing their hold on the minds and hearts of the people. 

But are there no shadows ? Surely there are, and some 
are dark enough. No land is without them, and we 
could hardly expect such a vast continent as South 
America to be unflecked by them. 

The worst, as has before been implied, is the shadow of 
a mediaeval Eoman Catholicism. I do not like to hear it 
called " Paganism " as some of my brethren are fond of 
denominating it. With all its darkness it is far removed 
from the fetichism of Africa, or the filthy Hinduism of 
the Ganges, and I do not believe that such epithets carry 
any conviction or make any converts. 

But Eoman Catholicism as practiced in many parts of 
South America, is a dark and degraded form of Chris- 
tianity, and it is undoubtedly true that the sanctions and 
restraints of pure Christianity have little effect on the 
great majority of priests and people alike. To show that 
this is no exaggeration, I quote, not from any Protestant 
source, but from the encyclical letter of Pope Leo XIII to 
the clergy of Chile, issued in 1897. ' ' It is sad to reflect," 
he says, "that prelates, priests and other clergy are 



334 THE CONTINENT OF OPPORTUNITY 

never to be found doing service among the poor ; they are 
never in the hospitals or lazar house ; never in the orphan 
asylum or hospice, in the dwellings of the afflicted or dis- 
tressed or engaged in works of beneficence, aiding primary 
instruction or found in refuges or prisons. ... As a 
rule they are ever absent where human misery exists, un- 
less paid as chaplains, or a fee is given. On the other 
hand you (the clergy) are always to be found in the 
houses of the rich, or wherever gluttony may be indulged 
in, wherever the choicest wines may be freely obtained." 

Most Protestants who were not absolutely familiar with 
the facts would hesitate to use such scathing language as 
the Pope himself here employs, or as was quoted in a 
previous chapter from the Bishop of Cochabamba, and I 
would refer for these facts to no prejudiced witness. 

Yet in spite of this corruption and degeneracy, which 
Catholics themselves admit, the Eoman Church is yet a 
great power in South America. There is no use in blink- 
ing this fact out of sight. It still controls the hearts and 
consciences of millions of the people. In some countries 
the women and consequently the children, are entirely 
under its domination. Its churches are imposing, stately, 
and often gorgeously adorned, to suit the somewhat bar- 
baric taste of the poorer worshippers. In Lima, San- 
tiago, Buenos Ayres, Eio de Janeiro and other centres 
will be found cathedrals which for size and beauty can 
hardly be surpassed on the continent of Europe, and 
scarcely equalled in North America. When we compare 
these churches with the insignificant Protestant chapels 
which in all but a few cases serve for the Eeformed 
religion, when we look at the bare, uninviting, and 
sometimes untidy interior of these chapels, and compare 
them with the gold and frescoes and the gorgeous and 
elaborate ceremonial of the great Catholic churches, we 
can forgive the unbeliever who sees but a little ways 



LIGHTS AND SHADOWS ON THE MAP 335 

beneath the surface, for contending that Protestantism 
has made no headway, and that Eoman Catholicism is as 
strong as ever. 

The trouble with the superficial skeptic is that he does 
not see beneath the surface. He cannot see the leaven at 
work in the meal, but the leaven is there. 

Yet, corrupt as it is, I do not believe that the Catholic 
Church of South America is to be destroyed. It has 
taken too strong a hold of the imaginations, yes, and 
of the affections of the people, especially of the women. 
The hope of the church is in a Savonarola or a Luther 
from among her own people, who may arise and purify 
her from within, or, failing in this, establish a pure 
religious faith that may attract the masses, and save 
them from drifting into open skepticism and unbelief, 
which is even now threatening South America with a 
greater curse than Catholicism. We need not despair 
of the rise of such a reformer or the spread of such a 
reformation. 

These South American countries have a way of under- 
going revolutionary changes in government and industry 
in the twinkling of an eye, as compared with the slower 
changes of older nations. In fifteen years more than half 
the continent changed from monarchical rule to repub- 
licanism, and established its freedom, and, when the 
time came, the other half (Brazil) made the same change 
in a single night, without the shedding of a drop of blood. 
The city of Eio de Janeiro has witnessed a like marvel- 
lous change which in two short years has changed a 
cramped, ill-paved, dirty, fever-stricken city into one of 
the most beautiful cities of any continent and one which 
can boast absolutely the finest avenue in the world. 

What can thus be done as by a stroke of lightning in 
politics and architecture, involving a like change in the 
temper and attitude of the people, may come at any 



336 THE CONTINENT OF OPPOETUNITY 

time in the moral and spiritual sphere. God hasten the 
day! 

There are already signs that such a prophet may arise 
in South America. I do not believe he will ever be 
imported from abroad. 

In Peru, Senor Forgas has made a great sensation by 
his free speech and his unsparing attacks on the Papacy, 
and though he does not probably have the positive belief 
and the spiritual stamina necessary to head a great reform 
movement, yet the fact that he has spoken and written 
so vigorously as to be practically banished from Peru by 
the Priesthood, and the further fact that he has obtained 
a considerable following and his numerous pamphlets a 
wide reading, point the way to a spiritual awakening 
which may at any time sweep over South America from 
Panama to Patagonia. 

The lack of good schools and the appalling illiteracy 
in many parts of the continent is another shadow on its 
fair surface. But slowly this shadow is disappearing, as 
the sun of- popular education breaks through the clouds 
of ignorance in which Eomanism has so long held the 
people. 

The frequent revolutions and political disturbances 
have set back South America for a full half century, as 
compared with her neighbours on the north, but these 
revolutions have been growing ' ' smaller by degrees and 
beautifully less," and no decade has been so free from them 
as the last.^ In fact, in the more progressive republics 
they may already be considered things of the past. 

Another great hindrance to the spread of evangelical 
Christianity and a shadow on South America which alas, 
has come from nominally Christian lands, is the looseness 
of the lives of foreigners in all the great cities. Drunken- 
ness, licentiousness. Sabbath breaking, and gambling 
abound among them, and even church goers and church 



6' 



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LIGHTS AND SHADOWS ON THE MAP 337 

members at home, I am assured, do not hesitate to 
patronize Sunday races in Buenos Ayres, and such large 
centres. "If Protestant Christian merchants and Chris- 
tian emigrants generally in South America were true to 
their profession, and consistent in their lives, I could 
almost say that there would be no need of missionaries," 
said a missionary to me, and I have heard his words 
reechoed by more than one. 

Such are some of the lights and shadows on the larger 
moral and spiritual as well as material outlook for South 
America. I cannot help believing that the light is win- 
ning its way, and chasing away the clouds. An impartial 
outlook over the history of the country for a hundred 
years certainly shows far more sunshine to-day than a 
century ago and the progress of the last quarter century 
has been unrivalled, showing that in a rapidly increasing 
ratio the light is gaining on the darkness. 

** "Watchman, what of the night in South America?" 

' * The morning cometh. ' ' 





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British Guiana (1827), Vene- 
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gentine Republic, 

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Brazil (1869). 
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Bolivia (1898). 

Arg. Rep., Uruguay, Paraguay, 

Brazil, D. & B. Guiana, Chile, 


Brazil (1882). 

British Guiana (1897), 
Ecuador (1896). 

British Guiana (1852), 
Argentine Republic (1898). 

Peru (1808). 


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leyan Meth. Conference 

13. Ex. Com. of Foreign Mis- 
sions Presbyterian Church, 
11. S. A. (Southern'* 


X4, First-Day Adventists 

IS. For. Mis. Bd. of the Bapt. 
Con. of Ontario and Quebec 

x6. Foreign Mission Board of 
the Seventh-Day Advent- 
ists 


17. For. Mission Board South- 
em Baptist Convention 

x8. F. M. Com. Presb. Church, 
Canada (Eastern Division) 

10. GosDel Union _. 




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341 



INDEX 



Africa, 19, 230, 235, 330 

Agassiz, Louis, 231 

Aija, 89 

Alaska, 229 

Alcorta, President, 284 

Alfonso, Bishop of Cochabamba, 

317, 334 
Almagro, Diego de, 21, 55, 79, 

88, 148, 149 
Alonzo, President, 120 
Alps, 114, 198, 214, 287 
Amador (Guerrero), President 

Manuel, 32, 278 
Amaru, Tupac, 117 
Amazon, 66, 133, 137, 138, 141, 

181, 231, 264, 272 
America (United States), 123, 

135, 137, 158, 163, 222, 225, 

226, 316, 322, 330, 331 
American Bible Society, 324, 325 
American College for Girls, 300 
Anchieta, Father Jose de, 233, 

312 
Ancon, 30 
Andes, 16, 49, 54, 99-108, 122- 

127, 130, 140, 141, 155, 160, 

161, 175, 177, 181-189, 192, 

194, 198, 201, 203, 204, 230, 

287, 288, 326 
Antigua, 46 
Antofagasta, 122, 130, 134. 137, 

155, 158, 159, 164 
Arabia, 249 

Araucanians, 149, 322, 328 
Arawaks, 230 
Arequipa, 107-113, 123-125, 287, 

313, 318, 323 
Arica, Province of, 84, 86 
Arizona, 203 
Argentina, 13-15, 18, 66, 118, 

119, 132, 137, 150, 153, 154, 

171, 181, 186, 188, 190-216, 



219, 221, 225-227, 267, 271, 
284, 288, 289, 295, 296, 301, 
306, 309, 316, 321, 328, 330, 331 

Arkansas, 295 

Artigas, General Job6 Gervasio, 
216 

Ascuncion, 221 

Asia 22 

Atahuallpa, 20, 55, 56, 77-79, 98, 
115, 279 

Australia, 22, 205, 226, 229 

Ayacucho, battle of, 82 

Azangaro, 89 

Aztecs, 47, 72 

Bahia, 230, 234, 292 

Balboa, Nunez de, 45, 46, 55 

Balkan States, 301 

Balmaceda, President Jos6 Man- 
uel, 153 

Baptists, 321 

Batty, Miss, 327 

Beaupre, Hon, A. M., 285 

Belfast, 150 

Belgium, 132 

Beresford, General Wm., 195 

Berkshire Hills, 147 

Berlin, 191, 205, 206 

Berne, 97 

Biobio, 149 

Bishop of Cochabamba, 317, 334 

Blanco, Guzman, 267 

Boers, 331 

Bogotd, 43, 44, 46, 48-50, 54 

Bolivar, Simon, 21, 24, 47, 48, 
56, 81, 82, 118, 198, 267, 269 

Bolivia, 13, 18, 54, 66, 83, 114- 
149, 153, 154, 156, 159, 160, 
171, 180, 191, 192, 194, 196, 
197, 203, 230, 231, 267, 288, 
298, 301, 302, 309, 316, 317, 
321, 330 



343 



344 



INDEX 



Bologna, 97 

Bombay, 142 

Borda, President, 217 

Bosphorus, 301 

Boston, 39, 87, 147, 176, 212, 218, 
221, 250 

Botofogo, 246 

Botucatei, 259 

Bourbon, 249 

Bourbons, 118 

Braga, Eev. Erasmo, 259 

Brazil, 13-15, 18, 19, 81, 119, 
132, 138, 194, 200, 203, 207, 
215, 216, 221-223, 225-227, 
229-262, 272, 288, 290, 295- 
298, 300, 306, 309, 312, 316, 
320, 321, 323, 325-328, 330, 331 

British and Foreign Bible Society, 
58, 324 

Brooklyn Bridge, 101 

Brown, Admiral Wm., 197, 216 

Brown, Dr., 320 

Brown, Miss, 298 

Browning, Rev. W. E., 176, 179, 
300 

Buda-Pesth, 240 

Buenos Ayres, 13, 181, 187, 188, 
191-194, 198, 201, 202, 205, 
208-214, 218, 220, 226, 227, 
242, 289, 291, 294, 296, 300, 
314. 325-327, 334, 337 

Buonaparte, Joseph, 196 

Buonaparte, Napoleon, 32, 47, 81, 
196-198, 235 

Cabbal, Lieutenant Pkdeo 

Alvarez, 229-231 
Cacha, 54 
Cadiz, 192, 265 
Cairo, 142 
Cajamarca, 56 
Caleta Buena, 159, 162 
California, 46, 101, 203, 258 
Callao, 82, 90, 92, 95, 161, 159, 

192, 325 
Cambridge, 107, 113 
Campifias, 257, 261 
Canada, 290, 331 
Canal Zone, 26-43 
Capac, Huiana, 54 
Cape of Good Hope, 229 



Cape Horn, 22, 27, 162, 332 

Cape Town, 124, 241 

Cape Verde Islands, 229 

Carabaya, 89 

Caracas, 194, 265, 266, 268, 269, 
287 

Caras, 54, 55, 58, 67 

Carey, Wm., 322, 323 

Carlyle, Thomas, 223 

Carpenter, F. G., 160, 203, 204 

Cartagena, 22, 44, 45 

Cassiquiare River, 272 

Castilla, President Ramon, 82, 
83, 281 

Castro, President, 267, 268, 274 

Catskill Mountains, 147 

Cavea, 241 

Cayenne, 275 

Cerrito, 214 

Cerro-de-Pasco, 89, 287 

Chachani, 109, 112, 113, 124 

Chibohas, 17, 47 

Chicago, 38, 63, 191, 205, 208, 
212, 248 

Chicama, 89 

Chile, 13, 18, 19, 61, 66, 83, 84, 
86, 88, 98, 114, 115, 118, 119, 
121, 122, 130, 131, 134, 137, 
147-181, 186, 191, 197, 198, 
200, 227, 230, 263, 283, 288, 
289, 296, 299, 301, 309, 320- 
322, 325, 328, 333 

Chili River, 109, 112, 124 

Chimborazo, 67 

China, 33, 46, 98, 225 

Chincha, 89 

Chinchon, Countess of, 81 

Chiriqui, 28, 29 

Christian Endeavour, 257-262, 
316, 328 

Church of England, 321, 326 

Clark, Myron A., 262, 327 

Cleveland, 19 

Cleveland, President Grover, 274 

Cochabamba, 132 

Cochabamba, Bishop of, 317, 334 

Cochrane, Lord Alexander, 151, 
169 

Coleridge, S. T., 113 

Coligny, Admiral Gaspard de, 234 

Colombia, 17, 18, 23, 24, 26, 43- 



INDEX 



345 



50, 54, 55, 57, 267, 278, 286, 
296, 306, 308, 320, 328 

Colon, city, 27-30, 34-40 

Colon, province, 28 

Colorado, 203 

Columbus, Christopher, 45, 264, 
. 265, 273 

Concepcion, 288, 300 

Congregationalista, 323 

Connecticut, 132, 295 

Constantinople, 301 

Costa Eica, 26 

Corcovado. 241, 246 

Cordova, 119 

Corea, 130, 131, 225 

Cornwall, 135 

Cristobal, 30, 35 

Cuba, 31, 33, 53 

CuzcQ, 17, 69, 73, 78, 115 

Dabien, 22, 28 

David, 28 

Dawson, T. C, 20, 21, 47, 79, 

194, 224, 232, 236, 265, 280, 

306 
de Anchieta, Father Jos^, 233, 

312 
de Balboa, Nunez, 45, 46, 55 
de Gama, Vasco, 229 
De Lesseps, 35, 38 
Dent du Midi, 126 
Denver, 53 
de Ojeda, Alonso, 264 
Desaguardo River, 126 
Detweiler, Eev. Mr., 324 
Diaz, President, 180, 284 
Disciples of Christ, 321 
District of Columbia, 198 
/^ Drees, Rev. Dr., 285 
// 'Dutch, 234 

East Indies, 229 

Ecuador, 13, 14, 18, 24, 48, 51- 

58, 63, 66, 67, 87, 88, 116, 118, 

128, 147, 287, 308, 324 
Ecumenical Council, 317 
Edinburgh, 69 
England, 13, 43, 68, 127, 159, 

191, 195, 219, 226, 268, 316, 

322, 331 
Epworth League, 328 



Eten, 86 

Europe, 53, 54, 80, 123, 132, 135, 

137, 158, 162, 163, 201, 222, 

232, 235, 299, 330 
Erery, Bishop, 326 

Falkland Islands, 271, 326 

Fellows, H. F., 326 

Fenn, Dr. and Mrs., 259 

Feraz, Colonel, 251, 254, 255 

Ferdinand V, 23 

Ferdinand VII, 196 

Field, Eugene, 142 

"Finger of God," 241 

Fleming, Eev. J. W., 325 

Flores, General, 57 

Floriano, President, 238 

Florida, 258 

Forgas, Senor, 336 

France, 43, 50, 132, 132, 133,203, 

205, 214, 234, 271, 276, 309 
Francia, Dr. Jos6 Gaspar Hode- 

riguez, 223-225 
Franklin, Benjamin, 21 
French, 31, 37 
French, Rev. Mr., 47 
Frost, Mr. R., 112 
Frost, Mrs. R., Ill 
Fujiyama, 125 

Galeba Tunnel, 101 

Gama, Vasco de, 229 

Gardiner, Captain Allen F., 322 

Genoa, 177 

Georgetown, 273 

Germany, 122, 159, 162, 268 

Glasgow, 150, 221, 248 

Gloria Hill, 245 

Golden Gate, 167 

Golden Horn, 167 

Gorgas, Colonel W. C, 31, 32, 

52, 53 
Gospel Mission of Kansas, 324 
Grau, Admiral, 83, 84, 153 
Great Britain, 15, 87, 120, 122, 

150, 162, 203, 235, 260, 271, 

274, 307 
Great Salt Lake, 131 
Greeley, Horace, 156 
Guano Islands, 64, 82, 83, 86, 

156, 157 



346 



INDEX 



Guayas, 52, 53 

Guayaquil, 51-53, 57-60, 62, 63, 

287 292 
Guiana, British, 271-277, 322, 

323 328 
Guiana, Dutch, 271-277, 322, 

323, 328 
Guiana, French, 271-277 
Guinness, Dr., 320, 322 

Hague Tribunal, 268 

Hallanca, 89 

Harrington, Dr. and Mrs., 137, 

302 
Harvard Observatory, 107-113, 

124 
Havana, 52 
Hayti, 295 

Hicks, Hon. John, 180 
Hoboken, 164 
Holland, 52, 68, 132, 271, 275, 

316, 331 
Holmes, Fitzgerald, 326 
Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 291 
Hough, Miss E. C, 259 
Hualcopo, 64 
Huascar, 55, 56, 115, 279 
Huguenots, 234 
Humahuaca, 118 
Humboldt, Alexander, 67 

IcA, 89 

Illimani, 128, 140 

Illinois, 198, 221, 296 

Incas, 17, 20, 22, 47, 54-56, 58, 

66-80, 85, 88, 98, 103, 115, 116 

127, 128, 148, 149, 230, 322 
India, 114, 235, 322 
Inglis, Eev. W. B., 325 
Instituto Ingles, 300, 301 
Iowa, 202 
Iquique, 159, 293 
Isabella, 23 
Isle of Wight, 140 
Isthmus of Panama, 13, 23, 26- 

44, 49, 53, 107, 147, 163, 192, 

204, 265, 332 
Italy, 202, 268 

jAHtf, 251, 254, 256, 257, 260, 
261, 328 



Jamaica, 266 

Jamestown, 174 

Japan, 46, 73 

Jarrett, Mr. and Mrs. J. L., 110, 

323 
Java, 249 

Jesuits, 222, 232-234, 312 
Job, Rev. Allen G., 110 
John IV, 235 
Juncal, 183, 184 
Junot, Marshal Andoche, 235 

Kansas, 202, 203, 324 
Earnak, 69 
Kelly, Dr., 323 
Kennedy, Eev. Mr., 386 
Kimberley, 235 
Kingston, 165, 166 

Lake Erie, 123 

Lake Geneva, 126 

Lake Ontario, 131 

Lake Poopo, 126 

Lake Titicaca, 108, 115, 118, 122, 

126, 127, 130, 131, 133, 135, 

136, 161, 287, 298 
La Paz, 120, 128, 131, 133, 134, 

136, 138-146, 175, 302, 321, 

325 
La Paz River, 140, 141 
La Plata, 181, 192, 204, 213, 214, 

220 
Las Cuevas, 187 
Leo XIII, Pope, 313, 333 
Lester, Dr., 325 
Lima, 54, 83, 84, 86, 87, 89, 90, 

92-102, 110, 175, 193, 194, 281, 

287, 290, 300, 323, 334 
Linares, Dr., 119 
Lincoln, Abraham, 21 
Linneseus, Carl von, 81 
Lion's Head, 241 
Lisbon, 230, 235, 238 
Liverpool, 59, 292, 294 
Llai Llai, 166, 182 
Lobos Islands, 91, 92, 158 
London, 97, 150, 162, 191, 208, 

245, 248 
Lopez, Carlos Antonio, 225 
Lopez, Francisco, 225 
Los Andes, 182, 268, 288 



INDEX 



347 



Louis XVI, 236 
Louisiana, 203 
Lutherans, 326 

Macartney, Rev. H. C, 326 
Madeira, 141 

Magellan, Ferdinand, 214 
Maine, 258 

Maracaibo, Gulf of, 264 
Martin, Alonzo, 46 
Massachusetts, 163, 295 
McGoon, Governor, 33 
McKenzie College, 259, 300, 301 
McLaughlin, Dr. W. P., 325 
Meiggs, Mr. Henry, 101 
Mello, Admiral, 238 
Mendoza, 187, 188, 201, 203 
Merida, 265 
Mersey Tunnel, 101 
Mesopotamia, 191 
Methodist College, 300 
Methodists, 300, 302, 320, 321, 

326, 328 
Mexico, 15, 72, 194, 284 
Michigan, 156, 163 
Milne, Rev. Mr., 325 
Minnesota, 259 
Miranda, Francisco, 266 
Mississippi, 203 
Mississippi River, 203, 205, 232 
Misti, 109, 112, 113, 124 
Mollendo, 86, 107, 108, 122, 123, 

125, 134, 137, 287 
Montana, 156 
Mont Blanc, 101, 113, 125, 186, 

214, 287 
Montenegro, 186 

Montevideo, 13, 195, 197, 204, 
n 205, 214-220, 290, 299 
'Montt, President Pedro, 120, 132, 

154, 172, 180, 283 
Moosehead Lake, 258 
Moquegua, 89 
Moravians, 275, 321, 322 
Moreno, President, 57 
Morillo, General Marshall, 22, 

23 
Mt. Aconcagua, 187 
Mt. Jefferson, 186 
Mt. Meiggs, 101 
Mt. Washington, 186 



Napoleon, 32, 47, 81, 196-198, 
235 

Nebraska, 202 

Neely, Bishop, 318 

Neill, Hon. Richard R., 281, 282 

Nelson, Wolfred, 29 

Nero, 262 

New England, 18 

New Hampshire, 114 

Newhouse, Mr., 101 

New Mexico, 160, 203 

New South Wales, 205 

New York, 205 

New York City, 19, 37, 39, 40, 
59, 63, 87, 97, 147, 164, 165, 
191, 201, 203-205, 208, 218, 
245, 248, 250, 260, 266, 274, 
292, 294-296 

Nictheroy, 245, 262 

Nombre de Dios, 192 

Norway, 316 

Nova Scotia, 147 

Nunez, Rafael, 24, 49 

O'HiGGiNS, Geneeal, 150, 177 
O'Higgins, Bernardo, 150 
Ohio, 198 

Ojeda, Alonso de, 264 
Omaha, 204 
Oregon, 163 
Organ Mountains, 241 
Orinoco River, 272 
Oroya Railway, 101, 287 
Oruro, 130, 132, 134, 136, 137, 
302, 321 

Pascamayo, 86 
Palma, Dr. Richard, 98 
Panama City, 13, 27-31, 34, 38- 

40, 52, 55, 59, 61-63, 107, 163, 

181, 201, 278, 292, 293 
Panama Province, 28 
Panama, Republic, 13, 16, 26- 

44, 49. 162. 221, 278, 279, 319, 

328, 332, 336 
Pando, General, 120, 132 
Paramaribo, 275 
Parana River, 191, 204 
Paraguay. 191, 194, 219, 221- 

229, 232, 322 
Paraguay River, 204, 224 



348 



INDEX 



Pardo, President Jos6, 281, 318 

Pardo, Don Manuel, 280 

Paris, 94-97, 191, 206, 208, 212, 
214, 290 

Patagonia, 19, 28, 191, 203, 336 

Pauliatas, 223, 232, 234 

Payta, 19, 63, 86, 89 

Pedro I, Dom, 236 

Pedro II, Dom, 237, 309 

Pernambuco, 194, 234, 235, 257 

Peru, 13, 18, 19, 24, 46, 51, 52, 
55, 56, 61, 63, 66-113, 115, 118- 
120, 126-128, 130, 134, 137, 
147-149, 153, 154, 158, 160, 
161, 163, 172, 180, 192, 193, 
196-198, 227, 230, 231, 263, 
264, 267, 279, 281, 282, 287, 
288, 298, 299, 301, 309, 316, 318, 
321, 322, 324, 325, 328, 330, 336 

Peters, Lewis T. A., 314 

Petropolis, 237, 242, 245 

Philadelphia, 37, 95, 191, 218, 
237, 258, 288 

Pilling, Rev. Mr., 325 

Piaagua, 159 

Piura, 89 

Pizarro, Francisco, 20, 21, 24, 46, 
52, 55, 56, 77-79, 88, 93, 98, 
115, 148, 149, 279, 281 

Polo, Dr. v., 281 

Pope, 45 

Portugal, 13, 23, 45, 233, 235, 
236, 245, 306, 307, 331 

Portuguese, 194, 233 

Potosi, 116, 135 

Prat, 150, 169 

Presbyterians, 300, 320 

Prescott, W. H., 70, 74 

Providence, 132 

Prussia, 205 

Puerto Cabello, 266 

Puno, 52 

Pyrenees, 188 

QUESADA, 47 

Quito, 17, 51, 53, 54, 57, 58, 287, 

324 
Quizquiz, 56 

Ealeigh, Sib Walter, 273 
Bamalbo, John, 232 



Reed, Rev. Wm., 324 

Regions Beyond Mission, 110, 
322, 323 

Rimac, 94, 95, 102 

Rio Claro, 257, 261 

Rio de Janeiro, 13, 201, 218, 232, 
234, 236-248, 252, 257, 259, 
261, 262, 289-291, 294, 296, 
300, 309, 323, 325-328, 334, 335 

Rio de Janeiro, State of, 262 

Rio Negro, 272 

Ritchie, Mr. John, 110 

River Plate, (see La Plata) 

Robert College, 301 

Rocafuerte, President, 57 

Rocher de Naye, 126 

Rocky Mountains, 287 

Rome, 290, 315 

Roosevelt, President Theodore, 
32, 41, 92, 284 

Root, Secretary Elihu, 89-91, 247 

Rothschilds, 247 

Russia, 132 

Sahara Desert, 160 

Sailors' Homes, 326 

St. Gothard Tunnel, 101 

St. Louis, 247 

St. Paul, 259 

St. Petersburg, 191 

Salt Lake City, 131, 203 

Salvation Army, 327 

Sandia, 89 

San Francisco, 165-167, 201, 

212 
San Juan, 207 
San Martin de Jos6, General, 81, 

118. 150, 197, 198, 267 
Santiago, 153, 166, 170, 174-180, 

182, 198, 288, 289, 291, 296, 

300, 301, 325, 334 
Santos, 13, 250, 326 
Sao Paulo, city, 230, 232, 254, 

257, 259-261, 296, 298, 301, 

302, 312, 326, 328 
Sao Paulo Normal, 296-298 
Sao Paulo, Province, 223, 250, 

251, 331 
Saraiva, Dr. Eliezer dos Sanctos, 

259, 328 
Scandinavia, 68, 87 



nn)Ex 



349 



Seine, 94, 95 

Shiris, 54 

Shuman, B. F., 327 

Snow, Mr., 112 

Sorato, 128 

South American Missionary So- 
ciety, 149 

Southampton, 294 

Spain, 13, 15, 19, 23, 45, 46, 47, 
77, 152, 192, 196-198, 230, 265, 
267, 273, 306, 307, 331 

Spaniard Harbour, 322 

Spenser, Edmund, 143 

Squires, Hon. H. C, 32 

Stark, Eev. A. R., 325 

Stevens, John F., 40 

Stockholm, 240 

Straits of Magellan, 189 

Straits Settlements, 135 

Student Volunteer Movement, 
320 

Sucre, General Antonio Jos6 de, 
56, 82, 118 

Suor6, 131, 136 

Suez Canal, 101 

Sugar Loaf, 241 

Sweden, 316 

Switzerland, 103, 121, 140, 188 

Sydney, 240 

Syrian College, 301 

Table Mountain, 124, 241 

Tacna, 84, 86 
XTfi'^as, 203 
O Thames Tunnel, 101 

Thibet, 114 

Tijuca, 235 

Titicaca Island, 127 

Toronto, 290 

Trans-Andean Eailway, 13, 166, 
181-189 

Trinidad, 328 

Tripoli, 132 

Tucker, Eev. H. C, 320, 325, 
326 

Tumbez, 89 

Turkey, 180, 226 

United States, 15, 30, 43, 44, 
49, 50, 53, 75, 91, 137, 147, 
158, 159, 162, 191, 196, 203, 



218, 229, 258, 260, 268, 272, 
274, 281, 286, 288, 289, 296, 
299, 306, 308, 309, 319, 327, 
331, 332 

University of California, 177 

Uruguay, 13, 191, 194, 214-220, 
225-227, 229, 257, 288, 299, 
321, 328 

Uruguay Eiver, 191, 204 

Utah, 131, 203 

Valdivia, Don Pedeo de, 149, 

174 
Valparaiso, 13, 19, 59-62, 150, 

152, 154, 159, 165-174, 181, 

198, 288, 290-293, 325 
Valverde, Friar Vicente de, 20 
Venezuela, 15, 18, 21, 24, 48, 56, 

263-270, 272, 274, 295, 296, 

306, 308, 320 
Venice, 265 
Veragua, 28 
Vermont, 114 
Verrugas Bridge, 103 
Vespucci, Amerigo, 231 
Victoria, 205 

Victoria Gospel Press, 327 
Victoria Sailors' Home, 326 
Villegagnon, Nicholas, 234 
Virginia, 174 

Waring, Colonel, 52 
Washington, George, 21, 266 
Watson, Eev. J. S., 89, 282, 

323 
Wenburg, Rev. J. H., 325 
Williamstown, 322 
Wilmington, Del., 100, 123, 258, 

288 
Windward Islands, 264 
Wood, Dr. Thomas B., 332 
Worcester, 288 

Xaviee, Francis, 233, 312 

Yorkshire, 260 
Y. M. C. a., 327 
Y. W. C. A., 327 
Yucay, 70 



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than that of dealing with the influx of foreigners. Of alien 
birth and strange language, unaccustomed to our methods, 
unacquainted with our ideals, • it is scarcely surprising that 
many are dismayed. To all such this book will be a tonic, 
describing, as it does, the people in their homes, on the 
way over, and meeting the new conditions. Slav, German, 
Scandinavian, Italian, Jew, Greek, all pass in view, and the 
keen pen registers the verdict of the unerring insight of a 
man, an immigrant himself, loyal to his own country, be- 
lieving in it with his whole soul. 

The Fortune of the Republic 

NEWELL DWIQHT HILLIS, D.D. 

i2mo, Cloth, $1.20 net. 

The time has long gone bjr when Home Missions were con- 
ceived to be confined to Sunday services. The making of 
a citizen is as much a part of the church's work as the 
making of a communicant. Indeed, the one should imply 
the other. The book by the gifted successor of Henry Ward 
Beecher and Lyman Abbott, is built on the broader plan, 
and shows, as no other book has shown, "The True Solution 
of Social Problems," in "The America of To-morrow." 

Our People of Foreign Speech 

i6mo, Cloth, 50c net. SAMUEL McLANAHAN 

"For those who are interested in the study of races this 
book will prove valuable. The author has gathered together 
statistics and information concerning the many peoples that 
are becoming so large a factor in American life. There is a 
fund of information contained in this little volume that those 
interested in the religious and socialistic problems of the day 
will do well to avail themselves of." — Presbyterian Banner. 

The Incoming Millions 

HOWARD B. QROSE, D.D. 

i2mo. Paper, 30c net; Cloth, 50c net. 

The study of the wider problems of Home Missions is 
being more _ and more recognized, and this volume, in the 
Inter-denominational Missionary Course, is one of the best. 

At Our Own Door 

S. L. MORRIS. D.D. 

Illustrated, lamo, Paper, 350 net; Cloth, $1.00 net. 

A Study of Home Missions, with special reference to 
the South and West, by the Secretary of the General Assem- 
bly's Home Missions, Presbyterian Church in the U. S. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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